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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28781538">in defense of the side character</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/aijee/pseuds/aijee'>aijee</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>SEVENTEEN (Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>(more like Players in Unavoidable Industry Friction to Amiable Colleagues to…Lovers), Alternate Universe - Entertainment/Film Industry, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, Slow Burn</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-05-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 07:47:24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>55,229</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28781538</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/aijee/pseuds/aijee</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>“Honestly, the marketing power of hiring an idol actor is stupid good these days—”</p>
  <p>“Yeah, well,” Wonwoo interrupts, face twitching at the subpar delivery of what’s supposed to be an emotional line in the film, “I guess it’ll be a surprise.”</p>
</blockquote>In which the picky screenwriter for Korea’s newest romantic film meets the ex-idol hoping to make his big acting debut in it.
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jeon Wonwoo/Kim Mingyu</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>126</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>300</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Gotta welcome the new year with some new fic amiright? Strap in boys, gals and non-binary pals because I’m back on my dramatic, rom-with-a-side-of-com BS seasoned with Tension, Feelings, and Learning to Adult. Very classic me. And that’s valid.</p><p>Before reading, do make sure that your work skins are on. The one I’m using is adapted from <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/20531333/chapters/50021519">this great tutorial.</a></p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
<p></p><div class="center"><p>IN DEFENSE OF THE SIDE CHARACTER</p></div><div class="center"><p>Written by Jeon Wonwoo</p><p> </p></div>FADE IN:<p>INT. CLASSROOM - AFTERNOON</p><p>Flashback sequence. Young HYEON JAESANG sits in an unused classroom with his teammates. On the television is a livestream of the national championship match for high school boys volleyball.</p><p class="character">COMMENTATOR #1</p><p class="dialogue">And with a stunning last-second connect, team captain MOON CHUNGHEE gets the ball in the air! He’s been an absolute delight to watch this season!</p><p class="character">COMMENTATOR #2</p><p class="dialogue">CHUNGHEE is a third year all-rounder with both serious offensive and defensive capabilities. Plus, his knack for leadership is very evident between rallies. I hear he’s nabbed the eyes of university scouts already…</p><p>Commentary fades. Zoom in on the TV screen with CHUNGHEE beaming, gleaming with sweat, fist in the air with cheering in the background. Then, zoom in on JAESANG looking wide-eyed and awed.</p><p class="character">JAESANG (voiceover)</p><p class="dialogue">The moment I saw MOON CHUNGHEE, I knew he was a star. If I could be someone in his amazing story, even if I’m just an extra, that would be enough.</p></div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>“Look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else.”</p>
  <p>Tom Stoppard, <em>Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead</em></p>
  <p> </p>
</div><hr/><p> </p><p class="p1">“What are their names again?”</p><p class="p1">“Pft, does it matter?”</p><p class="p1">“I guess not.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo tries to not scowl (and fails spectacularly doing so) at the conversation happening behind him. The scriptwriters usually congregate in the little nook next to the filming stage when recording is about to start, so Wonwoo isn’t exactly irritated that he can hear them—they always do this—but he’s pretty sure the guests themselves can as well.</p><p class="p1">“What was that?” an older writer inevitably taunts.</p><p class="p1">“Nothing,” Wonwoo inevitably says. Like clockwork.</p><p class="p1">His eyes find the nearest idol: a young thing with a face more decadent than his terrible cotton candy hair. There’s a sag to his shoulders that makes him look shorter than he already is. But he isn’t supposed to do that, Wonwoo knows. The script says he’s supposed to be energetic and cute and ready to dance into frame for the variety show he and his group have been invited to.</p><p class="p1">And, when the cameras are on, he does just that—perfectly, to all the beats in the script he was given.</p><p class="p1">Every Korean network seems to be riding the Hallyu wave as hard as a bull rider and Wonwoo has just about <em>had it</em>. Companies are paying balls off the wall for scriptwriters to keep clean the newest faces of the country, which is all well and good for the economy this side of entertainment. But there are only so many faces of surprise and aegyo moments Wonwoo can script into an hour-long episode before he physically wants to shove the words back down the orifices they came from.</p><p class="p1">Bong Joon-ho can eat his Emmy. This country’s artistic integrity is hanging on a thread.</p><p class="p1">
  <em>Bzzt, bzzt, bzzt.</em>
</p><p class="p1">“Excuse me,” Wonwoo murmurs, leaving before anyone can question it.</p><p class="p1">With practiced ease, he slips into the disarray of wires and people behind the cameramen. He almost trips over the skirt of an older makeup artist—“Fuck, sorry noona.” “It’s fine, just hurry back before you get scolded!”—and then stumbles into the hallway outside.</p><p class="p1">Gleaming tile walls and white light burn after the darkness of a studio on air, so it takes a second for Wonwoo to blink the vision back into his eyeballs.</p><p class="p1">Huh. He doesn’t recognize this number.</p><p class="p1">Tentatively, he answers. “Hello?”</p><p class="p1">“Just move that shit over—” a distant crash resounds on the line, followed by a prickly sigh, “Damn it. Oh! Hello, is this Jeon Wonwoo’s number?”</p><p class="p1">“Um, yes. Is everything okay?”</p><p class="p1">“Everything is fine, great, <em>fantastic</em>,” the manic voice is saying, almost breathless like his brain is running faster than his mouth, “And so will <em>you</em> after I tell you that my name is Yoon Jeonghan. I’m the CEO of—”</p><p class="p1">“Pledis Entertainment and Arts Corporation,” Wonwoo says, hushed, throat suddenly tightening in shock. “I, it’s a <em>great</em> honor to make your acquaintance, sir.”</p><p class="p1">“Yes, fine, great, wonderful. I’m calling you with some fun news, Mr. Jeon! It’s about—<em>oi</em>, watch where you put that! Someone already—god, I work with fucking amateurs..."</p><p class="p1">The phantom hand around Wonwoo’s neck tightens in both disbelief and anticipation because why the hell is someone like Yoon Jeonghan calling Wonwoo? Through his personal phone? In the middle of a work day and sounding like he might pop a vein any moment?</p><p class="p1">Wait, unless—</p><p class="p1">“Jesus, do people think money grow on trees?” Jeonghan’s growling annoyance is expelled with a prim cough. “Anywho, what’s your schedule looking like in the next…four to six months? Give or take? Oh, and ignore your current work. I’ve got people talking to your company already about temporarily suspending whatever you’ve got going on there.”</p><p class="p1">“Oh, um. Then. I’m free? But—”</p><p class="p1">“Fantastic! Very fantastic, exactly what I like to hear.” A little more muffled yelling. Another throat clear. “You’ll get an email soon from us about a table read scheduled in the next month or so—”</p><p class="p1">“Mr. Yoon? Sir?”</p><p class="p1">“What?”</p><p class="p1">Not the type to like being interrupted. Noted.</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo takes a breath to gather his wits before asking: “Excuse my rudeness, but what exactly might you be calling for? I don’t think that was ever clarified.”</p><p class="p1">A dangerous silence passes. And then Jeonghan’s bellowed laughter pierces the silence like molten sugar in the thick of oil.</p><p class="p1">“You’re right! That’s totally my bad,” apologizes the youngest CEO to ever lead a mainstream entertainment company in South Korea. “Here’s the punchline. Get a tight grip on your pants, yeah?”</p><p class="p1">“I. Yes.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo is smart enough to recognize exactly where this conversation is going. And yet nothing could prepare him for the next string of words to come out of his phone speaker:</p><p class="p1">“Mr. Jeon Wonwoo, your script has been officially green-lighted for production. Congratulations! <em>Pew, pew</em>, confetti guns sounds—<em>hey</em> what the <em>hell</em> did I just <em>say</em>—<em>”</em></p><p class="p1"> </p>
<hr/><p class="p1"> </p><p class="p1">Jeon Wonwoo is twenty-four.</p><p class="p1">He has a stable job, a nice apartment, no pets. With his long work hours, he doesn’t trust himself to care for a living, breathing thing outside himself, so Jun brought him some cacti and a giant pot of plastic palm fronds.</p><p class="p1">“To break up the monotony of the place,” he’d reasoned.</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo had said, “Right,” after glancing at the white expanse of his walls. Since moving in, nothing really has changed.</p><p class="p1">Jeon Wonwoo is twenty-four, with work, a home, and no pets but there’s low-maintenance foliage and it’s—enough.</p><p class="p1">He’s a writer by trade and, if his recent promotion is any indication, not too shabby for the three years he’s been doing it. Even so, it would be a disservice to Lizzie McGuire if he told you that this is what dreams are made of.</p><p class="p1">He majored in acting, you see.</p><p class="p1">This statement is one of the few decorations in his apartment: a hanged and framed diploma, “Major in Acting” printed in big, flourishing script next to littler, flourishing script indicating a minor in screenwriting.</p><p class="p1">Jeon Wonwoo liked writing enough, sure—the job would be a pain in the ass otherwise. But he’d always imagined standing in front of the camera lens, on the big screen in spliced pieces of award-winning performances. He’d imagined calling an assistant for eye drops when he has to cry, and running a thumb across a beautiful actress’s face before kissing her for the perfect, heart-wrenching shot.</p><p class="p1">Turns out good grades in school don’t always translate to real life. Go figure.</p><p class="p1">“It must be nice being an idol these days,” a nameless extra once sighed beside Wonwoo on a movie set. “If you’ve got the face and fanbase, auditions don’t even matter. Views are views.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo couldn’t help but stare at the faraway A-list actors and the newest faces on Naver’s trending pages. Gathered around the replay screen, they laughed like gods, at home in their own echelon.</p><p class="p1">Back then, Wonwoo had replied, “At least we helped move the story forward.”</p><p class="p1">He, too, was just a side piece to the bigger picture. Maybe this is how it’s meant to be.</p><p class="p1">Life isn’t a manhwa, he tells himself. Life isn’t an easy beginning, middle, and end punctuated by a cash grab sequel or two. Life is anything but an expectation or reward system. And Wonwoo, at twenty-four with a job and apartment and low-maintenance foliage, knows to not to beg for more when he has enough.</p><p class="p1">But then More Than Enough rolls around and, well, it’s certainly not something he’d shut the door on.</p><p class="p1">“How about <em>Miracles by the Sea?</em>” Soonyoung asks from the bookcase. He arrived not long ago with three kinds of fried chicken and a whole liter of beer. “Ooh, screw that, let’s watch <em>Without Honor.</em> Shitty rival aside, that was one of your better performances.”</p><p class="p1">The big screen will always be where his heart lies, locked away in one of many footnotes in his autobiography. But Wonwoo really does harbor a special fondness for his independent films.</p><p class="p1">“Sure, I liked that one, too,” Wonwoo assents, grin on his face. It feels strange, like a plastic mask that’s actually his face. “I’ll set up the food and then—”</p><p class="p1">A chicken-greasy forefinger magnetizes to Wonwoo’s lips.</p><p class="p1">“It’s your day, compadre, so you better get your magic-making phalanges off the goods and let yours truly arrange dinner. Take it easy! Shoo, deal with the movie! Shoo!”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo actually considers tackling Soonyoung into the couch in his usual brand of annoyed affection, but he accepts the shoulder punch instead and heads to the television. Soonyoung is an ass and a half most days and Wonwoo can deal with it almost as often—then <em>this</em> shit happens and forces a gleam to Wonwoo’s eyes beneath the light of the loading screen.</p><p class="p1">“Jun says he’ll be late. Had a last-minute audition,” says Soonyoung, chewing through another chicken leg. “He gets the ground, by the way, because you—well, you’re okay. And we’re celebrating you today. But I don’t trust his hands anywhere near you while I’m around.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo rolls his eyes. “You flatter yourself too much. As if he’d enjoy being scrutinized by your gross eyes.”</p><p class="p1">“How dare you? My eyes are treasures and <em>way</em> cuter than yours.”</p><p class="p1">“Sure they are, honey.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo walks over to squish Soonyoung’s face in his hands, then laughs when he’s violently swatted away and smooched on the cheek with lips as chicken-greasy as Soonyoung’s fingers. Two beers are poured right after and clinked in their petite disposable cups.</p><p class="p1">Once the opening soundtrack starts, Wonwoo would usually start hyper-analyzing his performance, nitpick the mistakes he made in delivery or things he wished the director told him before filming. Soonyoung would then yell at him to <em>shut the fuck up and enjoy the god damn movie</em>, smother him with a throw pillow and threaten to sit on top of Wonwoo until he did indeed shut the fuck up. To some extent, Wonwoo might even enjoy the god damn movie.</p><p class="p1">But Soonyoung breaks routine with:</p><p class="p1">“Do you know who got cast?”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo’s open mouth closes. It opens again.</p><p class="p1">“No, actually.”</p><p class="p1">“Even the Internet was dry? Stupid question, not an adaptation.”</p><p class="p1">“The table read is happening first before announcements, apparently, to see what the dynamics are like. Mr. Yoon seemed pretty excited about the cast so far, though.”</p><p class="p1"> On-screen Wonwoo snatches the collar of his rival and growls in his face, saying some platitude about honor and integrity and staying true to his heart’s mission. Whatever the hell that means.</p><p class="p1">“Do you think he brought in real famous people?” Soonyoung continues, growing excitement clear. “Yoon Jeonghan is known for roping in big names, especially into pet projects, which I can bet Jun’s shoe collection that—”</p><p class="p1">“Why are you betting Jun’s stuff?”</p><p class="p1">“Because you don’t give a shit about mine so <em>anyway,”</em> Soonyoung clears his throat. “I bet Yoon Jeonghan <em>loves</em> your script because he’s a chronic sucker for throwing a middle finger at mainstream trends. With Korean Hollywood going through its emo, psychological thriller phase right now, your story is <em>gold</em>. And the chance to play doll with two hot guy co-leads? Instant banger. Can you even imagine a volleyball uniform on Park Jinyoung? The cute one, not the other one. Honestly, the marketing power of hiring an idol actor is stupid good these days—”</p><p class="p1">“Yeah, well,” Wonwoo interrupts, face twitching at the subpar delivery of what’s supposed to be an emotional line in the film, “I guess it’ll be a surprise.”</p><p class="p2"> </p>
<hr/><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">It would be a severe understatement to say that Jeon Wonwoo isn’t overprotective of his script. With how much of himself he poured into the damn thing, it’s as close to a child as he’s probably going to get.</p><p class="p1">So when Wonwoo arrives at the table read, half awake but shaking with anticipation and far too much caffeine in his veins, the last thing he wants to see is an amateur cast.</p><p class="p1">“I’m Choi Seungcheol,” says the veteran actor with a legendary acting range (and wow that face is something else up close). “I’ll be playing one of the leads, Moon Chunghee. Pleasure to meet you all.”</p><p class="p1">And an expert cast Wonwoo gets—</p><p>For a peaceful twenty-seven minutes until some tall, gangly asshole with really loud breathing suddenly stumbles into the room with the piercing screech of rubber soles on vinyl flooring. Close behind is a pretty lady with pin-straight hair and a slate pantsuit.</p><p class="p1">“We’re <em>so</em> incredibly sorry for our lateness,” says Pretty Pantsuit Lady. “I’m Jung Chaeyeon, his manager. We had an appointment that ran later than expected and the traffic was—Kim Mingyu, I swear if you don’t bow <em>right now</em> I’ll rip your head off when we get back.”</p><p class="p1">Despite her initial decorum, Pantsuit Lady has no issue snatching the back of the guy’s head—“Ow, Chae, your nails!”—before pushing him down into a bow. She, too, bows profusely.</p><p class="p1">Someone who sounds like Yoon Jeonghan is cackling. Wonwoo can pinpoint the pulse in his own jaw.</p><p class="p1">“Well,” drawls Lee Jihoon, the venomously unimpressed director, “Now that you’re here, hurry up and introduce yourself and the character you’re playing. And get your ass over here, we don’t have all day.”</p><p class="p1">To his credit, this Kim Mingyu character is quick to bounce back with a shiny smile and impeccably straight posture that makes him even taller than he already seemed. Appearance-wise, at least he fits the bill, even with “novice” painfully written all over that powdered face of his.</p><p class="p1">“My name is Kim Mingyu!” is declared too loudly in an odd lisp and odder voice texture. “I’ll be playing Hyeon Jaesang. This is my first big movie role, so I hope you all take care of me!”</p><p class="p1">Somewhere in Wonwoo’s caffeine-buzzed, internally exhausted, and mildly (increasingly) annoyed body, a vein <em>definitely</em> pops.</p><p class="p2"> </p>
<hr/><p class="p2"> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p>INT. GYMNASIUM - AFTERNOON</p>
  <p class="p3">Freshmen stand in a line in the middle of the gym. The current members of the university volleyball team face them in team sweatsuits. CHUNGHEE is holding a clipboard and steps forward.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Welcome! Hopefully the first day of uni wasn’t too crazy. I’m MOON CHUNGHEE, a third year and assistant coach – hey, shut it. (Laughs) I know I’m not the female manager of your dreams, but I used to be a player, too, so don’t even try slacking off or —</p>
  <p class="p3">The gym door swings open, revealing the tall silhouette of JAESANG, breathing heavily with one kneepad on and the other in his hand. He locks eyes with CHUNGHEE.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE (cont’d)</p>
  <p class="dialogue">– be late to practice.</p>
  <p class="p3">Side shot of CHUNGHEE and JAESANG looking at each other before CHUNGEE motions him in. JAESANG dashes inside and tosses his bag at the benches. As CHUNGHEE continues to speak, JAESANG lines up and starts putting on his other kneepad.</p>
  <p class="p3">Zoom in on JAESANG’s reddened face.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG (voiceover)</p>
  <p class="dialogue">This is how I met the love of my life. Believe it or not, it gets worse.</p>
</div><p class="p2"> </p>
<hr/><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">It takes a hot second for Wonwoo to process the god-awful chemistry between someone as seasoned as Seungcheol and someone as…unseasoned as Mingyu. But then Wonwoo realizes another thing:</p><p class="p1">He’s worked with Mingyu before.</p><p class="p1">It was several months into writing for MBC’s lowest rank of variety shows, one of which attracted C-tier boy groups like moths to a bright flame.</p><p class="p1">Mingyu was in one of them. Aside from the random flubs he’d make off the script (which were pretty refreshing, if Wonwoo’s being honest), Mingyu wasn’t particularly memorable. Just tall. And nice. And prone to dropping things. Wonwoo distinctly recalls Mingyu mentioning playing volleyball in high school for a couple months before idol training started kicking in. Casting was accurate in that regard, at the very least.</p><p class="p1">The group seemed lively and handsome enough back then. It’s both surprising and not to hear they disbanded already.</p><p class="p1">“Disbandment after a year seems hasty,” he comments, leaning against his chair at the back of the room with the other non-actors. “Didn’t they reach the top twenty on Melon at some point?”</p><p class="p1">Chaeyeon’s polite “mhm” belies the ferocity of her texting speed. Something about the next schedule, probably. She grunts and shoves the phone into her bag before snatching her iced tea from the floor and taking an intense sip.</p><p class="p1">With a <em>pah, </em>she explains, “The group didn’t look like they were going to break even soon enough, so the company thought it was safer to scrap the whole thing and invest in the popular ones. Mingyu better thank his parents every single day for that face ‘cause it got him a place in showbiz and <em>still </em>have a livable wage.”</p><p class="p1">“How about the others in the group?”</p><p class="p1">“They are where they are.”</p><p class="p1">“Were you their manager back then, too?”</p><p class="p1">“I,” she says with a distant look, somewhere in Mingyu’s direction, “I was. One of their group managers, yes.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo hums in acknowledgement, glancing at the bright look in Mingyu’s eyes before returning to the script on his lap.</p><p class="p1">He can systematically recount almost every revision he’s made since the first draft. And yet having the physical paper thing in front of him, full weight on his thighs and production company name printed right below his own, still feels heavy and foreign.</p><p class="p1">“‘Uh, hey! Chunghee sunbae? Would you, erm, will you…’”</p><p class="p1">“‘Jaesang? You’re still in the gym? Well, spit it out, I still need to change—’”</p><p class="p1">At this point, Jaesang is trying to rope Chunghee into practicing serves with him, all the while avoiding any mention of his idolization of Chunghee in high school. Considering how awkward and sincere Jaesang is meant to be, Mingyu’s clumsy delivery isn’t...horribly incongruous.</p><p class="p1">“It’s a nice story, you know,” says Chaeyeon, sudden. Wonwoo senses a gentle smile somewhere in her words. “Our executives rejected it at first—you know how it is. But when I got it in the mail, I couldn’t stop reading it. I even sneaked it to Mingyu when the other managers weren’t looking.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo’s grip on his own forearm tightens, thumb intermittently overlapping each fingernail like silent piano keys, like a knot on a bag to keep any stupid cats from dying of curiosity.</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo says nothing. Chaeyeon does a poor job of masking a chuckle.</p><p class="p1">“We ended up fighting those executives for the audition anyway because this story is just so, so...”</p><p class="p1">“Marketable romcom bullshit?”</p><p class="p1">“Honest,” says Chaeyeon, “and Mingyu’s really good at being that.”</p><p class="p1">The person in question manages to bite his tongue during someone else’s monologue. Everyone seems to find it endearing, for some reason.</p><p class="p1">Chaeyeon laughs another set of tired sounds. “Trust me, I know what that guy is capable of, so if there’s anything I can assure you of, it’s his tenacity to improve and, hopefully, do well.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo sees everyone turn a page and quickly follows suit.</p><p class="p1">“We just met and you’re telling me all of this?” he sort-of asks.</p><p class="p1">“Because we can tell you really care about this,” she not-quite answers. “And we know that type of motivation isn’t taken seriously enough sometimes.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo’s ears suddenly feel overheated, like overblown glass.</p><p class="p1">Behind his eyelids is a diploma with big, flourishing script next to littler, flourishing script. A buried resume. A footnote in an imaginary autobiography.</p><p class="p1">In front of him, Wonwoo sees a complete novice with a shiny smile and impeccably straight posture. No fancy paper. No footnotes. Maybe that’s what a protagonist is supposed to be.</p><p class="p1">“It’s just a story,” Wonwoo states, voice control trained and flawless. “I’m only here to see what happens to it.”</p><p class="p2"> </p>
<hr/><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">That’s a lie. He’s still got shit to do.</p><p class="p1">Filming officially starts in a month and a half, during which actors will undergo a diligent training regimen for both physicality and the sport itself. Wonwoo is expected to work with Jeonghan and his writing cronies to finalize the script, which will give actors the time to memorize all one hundred and twenty plus pages.</p><p class="p1">“My head hurts just thinking about it,” Mingyu groans, fingers digging into his temples as he towers over Chaeyeon, who barely pays attention as she furiously texts again. “The most I’d memorized was for songs and dances and that one time on that variety show. What was it again? The Manager?”</p><p class="p1">Chaeyeon snorts. “Yeah, then you forgot half your lines before blasting me for nagging you about overeating. Which you do.”</p><p class="p1">“I do not!”</p><p class="p1">“You do.”</p><p class="p1">“…So what if I do? The hosts still thought I was funny! I <em>am</em> funny.”</p><p class="p1">“Two out of ten max, but at least your face…at least your face.”</p><p class="p1">Chaeyeon holds up a hand, like a pause button on Mingyu’s oncoming indignant protest. She excuses herself for the incoming call—“I would’ve picked up if I was in a place I could swear at you, you <em>unbelievable</em> dunce,” she hisses into the phone—before leaving Mingyu behind. It’s almost funny, that sight, so unsure of what to do with his mouth and hands now that he can’t convince his manager of an apparent talent for comedy.</p><p class="p1">Eight minutes past five p.m. Eight minutes too long.</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo remembers to pack away the taped-up pen he’s had since college, to find the highlighter he dropped earlier but honestly couldn’t care about after it stopped working halfway through the table read anyway, ah, there it is—</p><p class="p1">“Is this yours?”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo’s fingers twitch in their approach of the offending thing in question. Now not on the floor. Now in the occupied hand attached to an arm attached to Kim Mingyu, crouched right in front of Wonwoo.</p><p class="p1">The black velvet cap is a poor attempt at obscuring Mingyu’s face because so much of it is still easy to see.</p><p class="p1">The liner around his crinkled, upturned eyes is smudged too much from nervous rubbing. On his nose sits a sweat sheen. <em>Does he have blotting paper?</em> thinks Wonwoo, alongside <em>Thank god </em>as Mingyu brushes back those annoying loose hairs just sitting out of place on his forehead, slightly curled from even more sweat. The ventilation was admittedly poor here.</p><p class="p1">Thin lips. Prominent canines. Two beauty marks stubbornly poke through the makeup—one on his cheek, the other at his neck.</p><p class="p1">Mingyu from the past aligns with Mingyu now for the most part, at least as much as a time-warped door still locks, but not as well as it used to. Wonwoo isn’t exactly a door expert to figure out why. Or care, really.</p><p class="p1">“It is. Thank you,” Wonwoo says, plucking the thing from Mingyu’s grasp. The delicate gesture must be funny because Mingyu chuckles at it. “What?”</p><p class="p1">“It’s just,” says Mingyu, “It’s just funny to think that something so cute and vibrant could be written by someone so…reserved.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo immediately stands up. Mingyu models him immediately.</p><p class="p1">“Just be blunt about it,” Wonwoo retorts, turning away to busy himself again. “It’s not like I’m a fan or famous person you’re obligated to be nice to.”</p><p class="p1">“I’m sorry?” Mingyu tries another laugh. The <em>nerve</em>. “I don’t think I understand.”</p><p class="p1">“I seem cold, reserved—I get it. Trust me, I’ve heard it a million times.” Wonwoo’s teeth ache from grinding them. “But I’m a writer, believe it or not, so I can write whatever the hell I want and it never has to be real.”</p><p class="p1">A pregnant pause elapses. Wonwoo sees the white in his own knuckles and forces them to relax back to pink.</p><p class="p1">Then: “I apologize. That came out of nowhere.”</p><p class="p1">“It really did.”</p><p class="p1">“I,” Wonwoo starts again, turns around to say something along the lines of <em>I’m sorry I’m just really on edge today </em>or <em>I’m sorry please don’t shit-talk the movie after it’s released</em> <em>because my career will be ruined and I want to be a cat dad before I die.</em> He says none of that.</p><p class="p1">Instead, Wonwoo nearly stumbles backwards into the wall behind him upon finding Mingyu’s expression very, unnecessarily close.</p><p class="p1">The nose sweat seems wiped off, at least, so it’s not so irritating for Wonwoo to look at the center of Mingyu’s face and absolutely no where else.</p><p class="p1">“You seem familiar,” Mingyu murmurs, gaze dragging across Wonwoo’s increasingly twisted features. “We’ve met before.”</p><p class="p1">It’s said like a statement rather than a question, as if doing so makes true his words even if Wonwoo happened to be a complete stranger. Which he’s not, as it were.</p><p class="p1">Hesitantly, Wonwoo nods.</p><p class="p1">“From work before,” adds Mingyu. “Definitely not anything recent.”</p><p class="p1">Another nod. <em>I’m getting a headache, </em>Wonwoo thinks.</p><p class="p1">“Ah, sorry.”</p><p class="p1">Seeing Wonwoo trying to merge with the wall behind him, Mingyu finally steps back. Wonwoo feels like he can breathe again without getting his mucky caffeine breath all over K-entertainment’s latest sweetheart.</p><p class="p1">“I guess that came out of nowhere, too,” says Mister Sweetheart to Wonwoo’s utter bafflement<em>. </em>“We’re even now, I guess!”</p><p class="p1">“Even? With who? Are you annoying someone again?” Chaeyeon says, short heels clicking back onto the scene. She offers Wonwoo a quick bow. “My sincerest apologies for anything weird he might’ve said to you, Mister Jeon, this guy’s got no filter. In any case, it was a pleasure meeting you. And Mingyu—your usual bad luck found a miraculous bit of good luck today. Photographer’s gonna be late so we can get some food. What do you want? Croquettes? Kimbap?”</p><p class="p1">“Those are things <em>you </em>want,” Mingyu quips. “I’m kind of hungry for some scallion pancakes, actually.”</p><p class="p1">When Wonwoo finds Mingyu’s eyes on him again, he flinches.</p><p class="p1">Before Wonwoo can react, Mingyu has already grasped one of Wonwoo’s hands in his—grip gentle but firm, like a business handshake between business partners with a history before the business meeting ever started. He flips the palm over, places the highlighter there, and closes Wonwoo’s fingers around it.</p><p class="p1">“It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance again, hyung.”</p><p class="p1">
  <em>Hyung?</em>
</p><p class="p1">“Please take good care of me. You have before.”</p><p class="p1">Mingyu gives Wonwoo one last look, bows, then argues with Chaeyeon about how itchy face masks are but ends up losing terribly so he puts one on anyway. He gets dragged away to what sounds like another photoshoot.</p><p class="p1">With a tightened grip, Wonwoo shouts, “Don’t be late next time! You better take this seriously!” to which he is immediately and only met with a faraway, but very distinguishable thumbs-up.</p><p class="p1">The buzz of noise has been slowly dying out with each person departing for the night. It must be tiring to have something else to do after this, Wonwoo thinks, rocking back and forth on his loafers with blurry memories of the past in his mind’s eye.</p><p class="p1">The vibration of a phone suddenly jolts him.</p><p class="p1">“Hello?” he answers, coughing in surprise at the rough sound that comes out.</p><p class="p1">“Won—oh god, you don’t sound so good. Are you okay? Was the table read that bad? It was, wasn’t it?”</p><p class="p1">Jun’s harsh turn from childish excitement to genuine worry does good things for Wonwoo’s nerves. “No, it was fine. I’m fine—no, <em>no, </em>don’t make that sound. I promise I’m fine, okay? Okay,” says Wonwoo, sighing. “What’s up? You rarely call before texting.”</p><p class="p1">“I have super good news! But I want to tell you in person,” Jun says, excitement replenished tenfold. “Can you come over?”</p><p class="p1">Something warm percolates from the top of Wonwoo’s head, across every goosebump on his skin to his fingertips and toes. He suddenly can’t wait for the call to end just so can grab an Uber ASAP and book it to Jun’s place.</p><p class="p1">“Yeah, yeah, sure I can do that, yup,” Wonwoo babbles with phone pinched between his ear and shoulder as he fumbles with the stupid zipper on his <em>stupid bag</em>. “Should I bring food? Drinks? Ah, wait, you already have that giant zinfandel from the other day and I hope to god you haven’t finished yet or else I’ll—”</p><p class="p1">Jun’s nice laugh doesn’t sound quite as nice through a phone. “Of course not,” he says. “I’ve got everything ready. See you soon.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo finally jerks the zipper over a stuck thread and fast walks past the last few stragglers to the door. That is, until he remembers the one thing he forgot to pack, trapped in his hand in a grip he didn’t realize was so tight.</p><p class="p1">A highlighter, a really useless one by all accounts for the fact that it stopped working halfway through the table read. The ghost of Mingyu’s fingers wrapped around it, around Wonwoo’s hand, still lingers like a phantom warmth of the memory imprinted there.</p><p class="p1">It’s not surprising, or at least it shouldn’t be. Wonwoo’s hands are perpetually cold so an interaction like that is bound to feel…more than it should.</p><p class="p1">In any case, Wonwoo is too lazy to open his bag again, so he tucks the thing into his back pocket and hopes it doesn’t fall out on the way to his impatient taxi driver.</p><p class="p2"> </p>
<hr/><p class="p2"> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p>CHUNGHEE dumps an armful of volleyballs into the cart before jogging over to one that fell, but JAESANG gets to it first.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I didn’t get to tell you earlier, but I really am sorry for being late. I got lost on the way here after class.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I figured, considering how scatterbrained you seem to be. Don’t worry about it. Just don’t be late next time, okay?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I promise! Ah, um…</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Hm?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Do you remember — erm, did you play volleyball in high school?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE<br/>
(hesitantly)</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I did. What does that have to do with anything?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Nothing important, really! It’s just, well, my team played in nationals at the same time yours did. Back when I was a first-year. But! But we never played each other, so, uh, we never met. Until now.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I see.</p>
  <p class="p3">CHUNGHEE motions for JAESANG to give him the ball, which JAESANG immediately does. Their fingers brush briefly before JAESANG jerks his hands back. CHUNGHEE stares at the ball, slightly deflated in his hands.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE (cont’d)</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Does that have anything to do with why you’re here?</p>
</div><p class="p2"> </p>
<hr/><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p1">Wonwoo manages to slip out of one shoe and his left jacket sleeve by the time Jun digs into him—fingers curling into Wonwoo’s waist, thigh between Wonwoo’s legs, lips into Wonwoo’s shocked but soon-to-be eager mouth.</p><p class="p1">The interface of lips and teeth and tongue and skin is demanding and hot, like a branding iron to the iced coffee chill of Wonwoo’s desperation for balance in endless heat. He skims his fingers up and across the broadness of Jun's chest and shoulders, tracing the taut, trembling skin beneath the thinness of the cotton shirt. It feels more filled out than before, at least since the piss-drunk night that started this all many months ago.</p><p class="p1">When Jun presses his thigh forward, Wonwoo gasps, silent but sharp and forcing their kiss apart with a wet <em>pop</em>.</p><p class="p1">“Give me a second to put my stuff away, horny asshole,” Wonwoo admonishes, head tipped back as Jun works at his Adam’s apple with more teeth—<em>ow</em>—than usual. “Have you eaten yet?”</p><p class="p1">“I’m working on it,” Jun says despite the smack it earns him. But being muffled by the collarbone in his mouth still earns him a tight-lipped whine from Wonwoo. “Quickie first, round two in the bathroom, then dinner, and maybe a third go if you’re up for it. How’s that sound?”</p><p class="p1">“Poor scheduling for the good news delivery I was expecting.”</p><p class="p1">“I can find a way to slip something in.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo exhales as evenly as the smoke in his brain will let him. He doesn’t remember being divested of his top clothes, or tangling his hands tightly into Jun’s hairspray-sticky hair, or biting at the underside of Jun’s jaw where he’s the most sensitive outside what his sweatpants aren’t doing a great job of hiding.</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo tugs Jun off by his hair, lips quirking at the annoyed sound Jun makes before the audible swallow made towards the darkened, but not unwelcome look Wonwoo offers him. Like a gift. Which it is.</p><p class="p1">This endless push and pull of control, submission, affection, more, <em>more</em>—<em>this</em> is what makes whatever they have so addicting.</p><p class="p1">It wasn’t always this way. But now it is. And how could Wonwoo be even more cruel as to deny himself such simple, accessible pleasure?</p><p class="p1">
  <em>Bzzt, bzzt, bzzt. Bzzt, bzzt, bzzt. Bzzt, bzzt, bzzt.</em>
</p><p class="p1">Jun, nearly heaving with his forehead on Wonwoo’s shoulder, murmurs, “Your phone’s ringing.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo, hand shoved into Jun’s pants and libido deflating rapidly at the idea of Jeonghan calling him <em>right now of all fucking times</em>, responds with, “I know.”</p><p class="p1">“Are you gonna get it?”</p><p class="p1">“I don’t want to.”</p><p class="p1">“You should. Might have to do with the film.”</p><p class="p1">“Christ,” Wonwoo says, grip tightening to Jun’s choked dismay. With his free hand, Wonwoo pats around his backside for a phone, which he finds and—</p><p class="p1">There’s a clattering sound. Glancing down at the floor, Wonwoo sees a familiar, defunct highlighter stick from the table read. The whole image looks awfully like deja vu.</p><p class="p1">
  <em>We’ve met before.</em>
</p><p class="p1">Suddenly, Wonwoo’s hand feels warmer, and he isn’t talking about the one around Jun. He tries not to think about it as he checks his phone.</p><p class="p1">Strangely enough, it’s another number Wonwoo doesn’t recognize. Do people not know how to text before calling?</p><p class="p1">“Hello?” Wonwoo answers. “May I know who this is?”</p><p class="p1">“Lee Jihoon,” a voice like lemon curd replies, “You might remember me from earlier. I’m the one directing your script. Sorry, I know you’re off work hours already. Do you have a moment?”</p><p class="p1">Jun bites into Wonwoo’s shoulder, which gets a light but cruelly intentional scrape of Wonwoo’s nail.</p><p class="p1">“Yes, of course. Thank you for taking on the film in the first place. How may I help?”</p><p class="p1">“I know the directors of some of the movies you were in,” says Jihoon. “I’ve seen you act before. I’ve also seen your resumé. I asked your company to send it to me.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo pauses, fully paralyzed.</p><p class="p1">“I know you’re already wrapped up in editing the script and, knowing Jeonghan, it’s going to be a real pain in the ass to fit in what he wants while keeping your own creative vision,” Jihoon continues, sounding very experienced in exactly this, “Which is why, for the sake of what you probably want out of this, I have a favor to ask.”</p><p class="p1">“I can’t exactly reject it if I don’t know what you mean.”</p><p class="p1">Jihoon chuckles, clearly appreciative of some pushback when tasteful.</p><p class="p1">“My proposition is this: visually, Kim Mingyu is perfect for the role, and his voice ain’t too bad, either. But his acting is rougher than the balls of my war veteran of a grandfather, plus Mingyu’s romantic chemistry with Seungcheol straight-up sucks. He was supposed to have an acting coach with him throughout this process, but the guy had an emergency and can no longer work for them.”</p><p class="p1">“Yeah?” Wonwoo says, tugging one more time at Jun who barely keeps a groan in his throat. “And, excuse the phrasing, but what does this have to do with me?”</p><p class="p1">“I want you to coach him.”</p><p class="p1">Jihoon’s tone is absolutely straight-laced. He is unironic from every possible angle of voice and tone no matter how many times Wonwoo reruns that sentence his head.</p><p class="p1">“You wrote the story,” continues the director. “You know it better than anyone. You learned how to act and by god you can do it, too. You help Mingyu with his performance, we get a banging film and make a shit ton of money, and you see your story on the big screen. Win-win-win for everyone.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo’s grip relaxes. Jun immediately sighs, like he’d been released from a chain.</p><p class="p1">“Sorry, did my call interrupt something important?”</p><p class="p1">“I’m just with a friend, don’t worry about it,” Wonwoo says hastily, “Is this what Jeonghan meant by having to clear my schedule?”</p><p class="p1">“I’m not Jeonghan but I wouldn’t put it past that motherfucker to plan ten steps ahead. He was a competitive chess player in junior high, you know, but don’t tell him I told you.”</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo’s jaw locks, eyes wandering to the ground to the stupid spot of neon yellow sitting as innocently as poison at his feet.</p><p class="p1">
  <em>It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance again, hyung.</em>
</p><p class="p1">“You’ll get paid, obviously,” Jihoon adds after the long silence.</p><p class="p1">“I—yes, I understood that that was implied. Thank you.”</p><p class="p1">“So are you gonna do it? We’re on a time crunch so I need a yes or no. Simple question.”</p><p class="p1">
  <em>Please take good care of me.</em>
</p><p class="p1">“I. I’m not sure if I’m qualified—”</p><p class="p1">
  <em>You have before.</em>
</p><p class="p1">Wonwoo squeezes his eyes shut and sighs. “But if you think I’m capable, then I’ll do it.”</p><p class="p1">He says it like there’s a gun at his head. This is Lee fucking Jihoon, one of the most lauded young directors in contemporary cinema. Only fools say no to him.</p><p class="p1">“Great, I’ll tell Jeonghan to make the arrangements with you and Mingyu’s company soon,” says Jihoon. “Thanks for your time, Mister Jeon.”</p><p class="p1">The call ends. And Wonwoo doesn’t know what to do.</p><p class="p1">He can already feel the anxiety boiling inside from all the shitstorms starting from this moment of a very possibly <em>incredibly </em>bad decision. The most coaching he’s ever done is the vicious feedback he’d give himself, and he’s 99% sure that ballpark would make anyone with a heart cry.</p><p class="p1">But this story is his. <em>His. </em>And he wants it to be his and as <em>him</em> as it sounds on paper.</p><p class="p1">None of the stories Wonwoo has read were about the teacher, or the mentor, or the person guiding the way. They’re never about the one sitting in the back of a room watching a real star on TV, or the guy with an internalized romanticization of caffeine addiction and writing utensils he never remembers to replace. Rarely are stories about side characters like him.</p><p class="p1">Stories always start with someone charming, tenacious, a little clumsy but willing to dive headfirst into the world around them—someone like Mingyu.</p><p class="p1">So for Wonwoo to agree to this? Well, he supposes that makes sense after all.</p><p class="p1">“Extra work?” Jun mutters, huffing, kiss pressed against Wonwoo’s jugular.</p><p class="p1">“You could say that,” says Wonwoo. “Anything for a good story, right?”</p><p class="p1"> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>WonHui? In <i>my</i> Meanie fic? I was never truly a purist. Also, full disclaimer, I have zero knowledge about how movies are actually filmed. </p><p>Also, also: <i>Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead</i> is a tragicomedy about side characters in <i>Hamlet</i> giving their perspectives of the main story. I’m not writing in that genre, per se, but I thought the opening quote was thematic. Great read and play.</p><p>As always, you can find me on <a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com">tumblr</a>.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>(“You have a talent for it. I can see it.”</p><p>It was after office hours.</p><p>Wonwoo was a fresh face in university and comically staunch about using contacts instead of glasses. It’s a new life, he would reason, a new him without any more self-imposed barriers to reaching his dreams.</p><p>He saw Joshua waiting for a reply and scoffed, “A talent? For what?”</p><p>Joshua’s smile was as much of his mouth as it was his eyes. Wonwoo wondered if teaching assistants could play favorites like this.</p><p>“Art,” said Joshua, holding out a hand. Wonwoo reached for it, finds skin warmed by the same oversized cardigan and half-finished barley tea on the desk. “Art is often just people, and you can read people well. You’ve always been really observant. Thorough. Empathetic, too—hey, don’t look at me like that. You know you forget often.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s fingers found the gaps between Joshua’s. “How can I forget when you keep reminding me?” Wonwoo squeezed their palms closer until they’re almost flat. “I guess it makes writing classes easier.”</p><p>“Have you ever considered that? Writing? You’re very good at it.”</p><p>Wonwoo paused, searched through the clarity of Joshua’s eyes and found nothing else. “I’ve,” he said, pausing. “It’s only to help with acting, honestly. To better understand the words behind the act.”</p><p>“Is the act always necessary?”</p><p>“Well, then it’ll be just words. My life can’t be just words.”</p><p>Joshua’s other hand sought Wonwoo’s cheek, which already felt and looked like a ripening tomato plant in summer heat. Joshua saw this and smiled even wider, enough for his eyes to crinkle like he might cry for some reason.</p><p>In five minutes, the teaching assistant for the best acting theory class Wonwoo has ever taken will decide on a new career path. It will sound laughable for someone Wonwoo once put on a pedestal, even before university.</p><p>In five minutes, Wonwoo will argue about it as if this textbook romance never saw the credits because it kept going, stubbornly, until reality was overripe.</p><p>In five minutes, Wonwoo will stop loving the person who made him fall in love with acting in the first place.</p><p>But, for now, he felt a pen tucked into his hand.</p><p>“You’re more than just words,” said Joshua, “Even your own.”)</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Wonwoo’s eyes snap open.</p><p>On his left is the begrudgingly familiar sound of his alarm.</p><p>7:00 AM. <em>Jesus.</em></p><p>On his right are the blinds he forgot to close last night and the sunburn he can already feel on the crusty marshmallow skin of his cheek. He touches it—yup, it’s warm.</p><p>When he sits up a little too quickly, a sudden soreness pierces his forehead. Fuck, what a <em>god awful</em> night of sleep that was. What day is it, even?</p><p>Oh, right. He’s supposed to meet Mingyu today.</p><p>At this point, Wonwoo has slogged through two and a half weeks of editing. He’s beginning to learn that Jeonghan’s bravado is, to some extent, well-earned from how worth the weight his writing staff has been. They’re being paid to translate a self-edited pet project into an actual marketable thing—and yet, somehow, the sincerity Wonwoo is desperate to keep is still miraculously there.</p><p>Cut back the high school flashbacks, write in more distant stares at the gymnasium.</p><p>Tone down the nervous freshman energy, amp up begrudging smiles from sunbae.</p><p>Stop with the past and focus on the now—on Jaesang and Chunghee as they are, dealing with the coming-of-age problems in adulthood no one ever really talks about in film with any degree of earnest.</p><p>“People spend too much time looking over their shoulders,” said Jeonghan once, shrugging as he leaned back in his chair and twirled around a bright red pen in his fingers. "Isn’t it more interesting to pay attention to what’s ahead of you? M’dad always told me that if I keep looking back, I’ll trip going forward.”</p><p>“Tripping happens regardless,” reasoned Wonwoo, testy, “So might as well do a little reminiscing.” He eyed a passage struck with scarlet marks. Damn, he really liked that part.</p><p>“True.” Jeonghan’s grin was toothy. “But some ways are easier to get up than others, right?”</p><p>There were jokes about physics, moving bodies in momentum, not knowing a damn thing about actual science to say anything even in that ballpark. (“Whaddaya take me for? Someone who’s trying to fix the world? We’re in <em>entertainment</em>, darling.”) Writing sessions never fail to be an interesting time, that’s for sure.</p><p>But today is a break from that. Today is a specially sanctioned day because of Wonwoo’s new...duties. As it were.</p><p>In the bathroom, Wonwoo traces a finger across his dark circles. Dark, puffy, as if he’d gotten punched in both eyes in his sleep.</p><p><em>You look like shit. More than usual</em>, he thinks, glaring at his foggy mirror. <em>Do celebrities ever look like this?</em></p><p>Before Wonwoo can stop himself, his mind wanders to a face <em>I don’t want to think about earlier than I get paid to. Stop it</em>.</p><p>First, floss.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Even though it’s atrociously stupid to wear sunglasses indoors, it’s the only way Wonwoo can feel respectable and somewhat put-together while surrounded by all these cherry-picked pretty people. At a physical training center. At this hour. Embodying that pencil-thin balance between sweaty in a bad way, sweaty in a good way, and sweaty in a <em>good</em> way.</p><p>With a deep breath and the comfort of a fresh iced Americano in hand, Wonwoo steps through the doors—</p><p>
  <em>“Watch out!”</em>
</p><p>—and is immediately smacked in the face with a ball.</p><p>Well, that’s what he expects.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p>JAESANG opens his eyes to find himself laying flat on top of CHUNGHEE, facing him. JAESANG’s eyes widen.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Oh god, are you okay?!</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE<br/>
(groaning)</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Might’ve lost a few brain cells, but I think I can still find the subway after this. How about y—</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE realizes their positions and how close their faces are. He turns his head away, which prompts JAESANG to scramble off of him. CHUNGHEE waves everyone away, like he can handle this. The coach subs in HEEJOO for JAESANG.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG<br/>
(dazed)</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Ah, I’m s-sorry…</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">How are you?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Huh?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I asked how you were.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">O-Oh, um, I’m fine. I probably just need to sit for a bit.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Okay. Alright. (sighs) Let’s get you a drink and towel, too, hm?</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE stands and helps JAESANG up from the ground. JAESANG seems fine, but CHUNGHEE still wraps JAESANG’s arm around his shoulder and walks them to the benches.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Hyung, I’m fine. I can walk.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Yeah, well, we can confirm that after you’ve sat down and cooled off. Stop being so irrational.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">You would’ve been hurt if you got hit!</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I’m not on the court, am I?</p>
  <p>JAESANG stops walking. Given his height and strength, CHUNGHEE is forced to stopped.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Does it matter if you are?</p>
</div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>In the split second past stepping foot in the gym space, Wonwoo immediately registers a blue and yellow thing accelerating alarmingly fast at his sunglasses like a magnet for bad fashion choices. He even turns his face so whatever baby fat hasn’t melted could cushion the blow instead of breaking his nose because no thank you, ma’am, there is literally <em>zero</em> space in his schedule for a hospital trip in the next six months.</p><p>But instead of the meteoric impact on his cheek he expects, Wonwoo registers a shadow. And then a person.</p><p>And then Wonwoo is smacking into the ground with the full weight of two cumulative bodies because, of all people, Kim Mingyu thought it so very fucking <em>princely</em> of himself to block the flying volleyball with his entire body before losing balance and bulldozing Wonwoo onto the floor in the process.</p><p>Truly, the sound of a full iced coffee spilling inspires pain like no other.</p><p>“Don’t worry, I’ll handle it!” yells a familiar female voice in the distance, “Please, go on with your—yes, he’s got the skull of a hard hat, he’s fine,” accompanied by the also-familiar click-clacking of short heels. Thank goodness for Chaeyeon’s crowd control. Wonwoo doesn’t know if he could handle embarrassment before coffee.</p><p>Mingyu has the mind, at least, to extract his himself from the ungraceful pile of limbs he made between him and his acting, no, <em>substitute</em> acting coach.</p><p>“Crap crap crap I’m so, so sorry, oh god, oh geez, I’m so sorry, I didn’t,” garbles Mingyu like his brain has a million words to say but his mouth is too slow to catch up. “I thought I could stop the ball with just my hand but I underestimated how far I’d jump and I also landed wrong on my feet because I underestimated how far I’d jump oh shit I already said that—”</p><p>Wonwoo holds up a hand. Mingyu, begrudgingly, stops.</p><p>“I’m fine,” says Wonwoo.</p><p>“Really?”</p><p>“Well, I don’t need an ambulance.”</p><p>That answer is clearly not the one Mingyu is hoping for, based on the spluttering noises following it. Whatever. Wonwoo stands himself up, forcing a neutral face at the novel ache in his hip, and holds out a hand.</p><p>He says, “How about you? Can you still walk? Any acute pains?”</p><p>Without real glasses or contacts, Wonwoo can’t see any clarity past his nose, so Mingyu’s expression is all up to imagination. Perhaps it’s confusion, or surprise, or panicked again which suddenly makes <em>Wonwoo</em> panicked because what if Mingyu twisted or broke something and suddenly all this movie preparation is derailed—</p><p>“Just a bit sore from the ball hitting my chest,” says Mingyu, tone indiscernible without a face to match it to, “But I’m pretty resilient, so you don’t have to worry about me.”</p><p><em>I have to</em>, Wonwoo doesn’t say, <em>because you’re the star.</em></p><p>A warm, slightly clammy hand wraps around Wonwoo’s for leverage. Mingyu pulls himself up. Wonwoo lets him and, ah, right, he was this tall last time, wasn’t he?</p><p>“Are you sure you’re okay?” Mingyu presses. “Like, <em>okay</em> okay?”</p><p>In deja vu fashion, in Mingyu’s other hand is a familiar item—sunglasses, now—whose owner is not the person holding it. Face now closer, Mingyu’s eyes and nose and lips are even more discernible in a way that implies scrutiny, perhaps even concern.</p><p>Wonwoo tugs his hand back and plucks what’s his from Mingyu’s fingers.</p><p>“As someone new to acting,” says Wonwoo, shield returned to his nose bridge, “It would do you good to talk less. Think more.”</p><p>It’s a provocation. Honestly, Wonwoo has no idea where it came from. Actor’s envy? Industry seniority? The chance for this amateur to prove he deserves to be a star in a business that would’ve starved him dry without that genetic jackpot? Whatever the intention, Wonwoo’s austerity usually cuts people like a guillotine—or at least thoroughly annoy them. Big egos make critiques bitter to swallow.</p><p>No response.</p><p>But Mingyu stares at him and Wonwoo can see it fully now, unwavering. As if this wordless exchange is a staring contest meant to be won.</p><p>Maybe he does listen.</p><p>With great effort, Wonwoo breaks his gaze away to look at Chaeyeon approaching them.</p><p>“Here, I think I got all your things,” she says, exasperated with Wonwoo’s belongings collected in her arms. “I’m so sorry for what happened, Mister Jeon, I promise I’ll make it up to you with another drink and meal on us. Is that alright with you? I know this is literally your first day of coaching Mingyu, so I hope you aren’t…”</p><p>“Incapacitated?”</p><p>“Dissuaded.”</p><p>To the sound of Mingyu’s amused, intentionally wordless laugh-huff beside him, Wonwoo kills the growl in his throat, swallows it down, and says:</p><p>“I’m still going do it. I signed a contract, after all.”</p><p>And so it is said. Stubbornly, even, from an abrupt and frankly embarrassing inclination for challenge. Wonwoo even considered hallucinating it entirely if not for the grin his new pupil is sporting without shame.</p><p>Fine, then. Wonwoo will play.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“Are you constipated? What sort of face is that?”</p><p>Despite the chill of the stairwell they’re practicing in, a warming satisfaction comes from seeing those canines bared in frustration instead of glee. Mingyu’s previous coach must have been a pushover if this is enough to drive the newbie up a wall.</p><p>“Well what sort of <em>feedback</em> is that?” deflects Mingyu, brows pinched and script growing finger dents from his grip. “What happened to the ‘constructive’ part of constructive criticism, <em>coach?”</em></p><p>Wonwoo feels the phantom eye-roll in his skull. That face of Kim Mingyu’s has been his foot in the door for his entire career. It’s a wonder how he can use it so dreadfully, at least outside the gaudy lip biting and winks as choreographed as the dance numbers he used to do.</p><p>“First of all, while over-exaggeration may suit your character, outright theater performance does not,” Wonwoo says. “Just because you have facial muscles doesn’t mean you have to use all of them.”</p><p>In saying that, Mingyu’s comical indignation softens to mildly less indignation.</p><p>Picking at the yakisoba Chaeyeon was kind enough to get delivered, Wonwoo continues, “Second of all, where should your mind be when speaking the words you’re given?”</p><p>“On the script?”</p><p>“Incorrect.”</p><p>Wonwoo sets his yakisoba a step down from where he’s sitting, now one less physical barrier from forcing a statue out of his marble slab. It’s there. Surely, it must be.</p><p>“Describe Hyeon Jaesang to me,” says Wonwoo precisely. “Tell me his strengths, flaws, aspirations, what he believes to be his greatest challenges from reaching his dreams.”</p><p>Immediately, Mingyu looks dumbstruck. Of course he would. He clearly hasn’t thought about his role past the flimsy printer paper he’s been given to—</p><p>“I don’t think I can answer all that,” says Mingyu, much more slowly, though intentional, “But I have ideas. I don’t think any of them are what you intended.”</p><p>Wonwoo waves a hand. “Tell me anyway.”</p><p>Mingyu’s gaze wanders up the walls of this small space around them, as if trying to parse his answers from the chilled concrete. His sneakers—a gift from an athleisure sponsorship, he’d said—are dangerously close to Wonwoo’s half-finished yakisoba.</p><p>“I think,” the words start, “hm,” another pause, and then, “Sort of in the same way humans are, like, seventy percent water, Jaesang is seventy percent feelings despite not really looking that way at first. That’s a strength and flaw, I suppose.”</p><p>“How so?”</p><p>“Well,” Mingyu hums, “People connect through shared experiences and being vulnerable; emotions are foundational to both, right? So people like Jaesang. Jaesang likes people. I’d even say Jaesang <em>loves</em> people. But he gets so caught up in what he’s feeling sometimes that he ignores the fact that there’s more to people than what he’s made of them inside his head. That’s a major conflict he has with someone more practical like Chunghee, or at least how he imagined Chunghee to be.”</p><p>Wonwoo feels conscious of the purse at his lips, but it’s not as if Mingyu is looking at him.</p><p>“And as for professional aspirations,” Mingyu continues, “Jaesang’s are very grand. Maybe too grand, frankly. So, and I don’t know if you meant it—audience interpretation, I guess—I think Jaesang’s biggest point of growth is in realizing the reality outside the court, that sheer talent and passion aren’t enough to overcome circumstance sometimes. That, too, is thanks to Chunghee, who’d experienced the same thing before.”</p><p>That’s not...wrong, Wonwoo supposes. Chunghee <em>was</em> in a similar position as Jaesang, just earlier in his life, and the trauma of injury <em>did </em>harden Chunghee to the inescapability of chance—or circumstance, as Mingyu had put it.</p><p>Audience interpretation, huh.</p><p>Wonwoo’s words tinge with snappiness. “Then why aren’t you practicing in that mindset? Where’s that person constructed of ‘seventy percent feelings’? For a character whose blood <em>runs</em> with sincerity, your acting falls as flat as the text on paper you keep trying to remember. The script is not your anchor. Your interpretation is.”</p><p>Mingyu’s eyes drift off the walls and grip onto Wonwoo, expression incoherent for a moment before those very eyes widen like seeing sunlight after being stuck in a windowless place.</p><p>“That’s—you’re so right, <em>so</em> right, the script isn’t at all what I should be thinking of!”</p><p>Mingyu’s gaze is alight with new, blazing vigor and smile wide enough for nearly the full set of his teeth. Wonwoo only notices then that they are, refreshingly, unidentical. Because they’re real.</p><p>“The script isn’t my anchor,” Mingyu echoes, if not insists. “You are.”</p><p>“Exactly, that’s what I’ve been trying—”</p><p>The words stop stale at the end of Wonwoo’s tongue, challenged by the fire palpable in every inch of body language seated in front of him: head leaned forward, smile lines deep, even hands and feet pointed towards the subject of all this excessive, saccharine attention.</p><p>Then, Mingyu says, “Be my Chunghee.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p>CHUNGHEE raises his eyebrows at JAESANG and chuckles almost incredulously.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I’ll give it to you. You’ve got spunk.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Is that a yes?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">What would you do if I said no?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I guess I’d keep asking until you said otherwise.</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE laughs again.</p>
</div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Seeing Mingyu’s gym shoes precariously close to the styrofoam noodle container, Wonwoo deepens the pinch between his brows.</p><p>“I’m already practicing with you,” he states bureaucratically.</p><p>“Well, yeah, I guess if that’s what you can call <em>this</em>,” reasons Mingyu, gesticulating about, “But whenever you give me a direction or something, all I can think about is you as the writer, which just reminds me of the script and doesn’t help me get into Jaesang’s mind or whatever.”</p><p>“I mean, how else am I supposed to coach—“</p><p>“You know the story best, right?”</p><p>An eye twitches. “Undoubtedly, yes.”</p><p>“The second heart of the story,” Mingyu declares with gusto, “is Chunghee’s growth with Jaesang as an unexpected—sometimes even unwanted—reference point at every story beat. And the same is true for Jaesang! <em>That</em> is what makes the story so compelling in the first place! The equality<em>, </em>the reciprocity, the back and forth of opposite personalities who have more in common than anyone would’ve expected. You know that, I’m sure you do. And you also know Chunghee better than anyone here—even my co-lead.”</p><p>Wonwoo feels his own nails, hidden in his lap, digging into the flesh of his palm.</p><p>“I still don’t know where you’re going with this.”</p><p>Wonwoo is clearly lying. Mingyu’s eyes soften.</p><p>He says, “Be my Chunghee.”</p><p>The way Mingyu says it is quieter this time. Less driven by a seeming stroke of genius, yet this is hardly so clinical as to be a bargain nor so intimate as to be a partnership.</p><p>A proposal? A business proposal? And then Mingyu’s lips arrange into something awfully unbusinesslike, tossing any consideration for business out the window. That doesn’t mean Wonwoo isn’t desperate still.</p><p>Like something in his chest, his fingers carefully unfurl.</p><p>“I’m not,” Wonwoo starts before rerouting his thoughts into, “How I see Chunghee will inevitably be different from how your co-lead sees him. Jihoon has already warned me of the incompatible chemistry between you two.”</p><p>Bewilderingly, Mingyu laughs. The boisterous sound echoes around them, traveling upwards like a hot air balloon in this cool space.</p><p>“The director thinks it’s that bad, huh?” Mingyu says, eyes undertaking a sheen of mirth. “Well, I guess that’s why an expert like you is here to help lil ol’ me. You’re more experienced than I am and, well, a contract’s a contract, yeah?”</p><p>There are million ways to respond to that, none of which occupy Wonwoo’s mouth.</p><p>Mingyu concurs with, “You do make a great point. You and Choi Seungcheol are very different. But, knowing how far back my starting line is compared to everyone else, I don’t think it would hurt to give my idea a shot.”</p><p>There is no fault in that statement. There is no angle from which Wonwoo can find reason to disagree as not only this amateur’s de facto acting coach, but also the singular individual whose top gain in this investment is neither financial nor professional. Wonwoo just wants a permanent, meaningful fingerprint in this dog-eat-dog industry. Here, sitting in front of him, is his closest chance to achieving just that.</p><p>So, Wonwoo says:</p><p>“‘I’ll give it to you. You’ve got spunk.’”</p><p>Mingyu perks up. As always, quick to react.</p><p>“‘Is that a yes?’”</p><p>The rigidity Wonwoo’s expression melts into something soft and warm, far more welcoming than before. He straightens out the hunched curve of his spine, tilts his head and chin just so, eyes hooded slightly in both confusion and amusement at the convincing eagerness in front of him.</p><p>There’s no explicit direction in this part of the script.</p><p>Wonwoo typically imagines Jaesang standing tall, hands stuffed in his hoodie pocket, looking up at Chunghee standing a few steps above him in front of the health sciences building. Chunghee would have finished his last class for the day and his face would be the textbook definition of astounded.</p><p>Jaesang would grin, all teeth, at the exasperated shake of Chunghee’s head. Then he would start walking away before signaling with a jerk of his elbow for Chunghee to follow him to a small sushi shop, a student hotspot.</p><p>And so Chunghee follows. And will have dinner. And briefly entertain the thought that, maybe, he might be enjoying himself for the first time in a while.</p><p>This is not that.</p><p>There are stairs, yes. There is vaguely Japanese food, yes. There are things unsaid, unasked, hanging in the air between two people dancing around an arrangement that seems to get heavier with every passing second—yes.</p><p>But instead of moving further away, Mingyu moves in closer, <em>very close</em>, until their shoulders are just a hair’s length from touching. Wonwoo is ninety-nine percent sure that, even without breathing, his breath smells of green onions.</p><p>So he keeps his throat tight. Something rhythmic fills it. He can’t fully identify whether the hand on his right thigh is his.</p><p>“‘What would you do,’” recites Wonwoo, “‘if I said no?’”</p><p>“‘I guess,’” says Mingyu, eyes bright, “‘I’d keep asking until you said otherwise.’”</p><p>If Mingyu could smell Wonwoo’s breath, then vice versa is inherently true for whatever is on Mingyu.</p><p>Wonwoo’s best approximation is a post-workout body spray, the kind that’s really just a mediocre cover-up of that morning’s training session. Nothing notable. But in here with so much of Mingyu encroaching on the personal bubble Wonwoo delineated—<em>very clearly</em> prior to practicing—it’s objectively hard to ignore.</p><p>Wonwoo’s fingers twitch. He discerns that the hand on his thigh is, potentially, not his own.</p><p>Suddenly a knock on a nearby door resounds, loud and cacophonous like banging metal pots.</p><p>“Hey guys—”</p><p>Mingyu retracts himself as Wonwoo stands up abruptly.</p><p>“—I was asked to tell you that it’s lunch break. Better hurry before the lines get too long!”</p><p>Wonwoo is mid-wipe of his sunglass lenses when his attention jerks to that voice.</p><p>The bright backlighting is torture to his eyes, but the silhouette is enough tell with how much of it Wonwoo sees in his own time.</p><p>“Something wrong, uh, Mister Jeon? Is that right?” says Wen Junhui, not at all convincing with his feigned ignorance. “Sorry, I was just recently recruited. I haven’t gotten to know everyone yet.”</p><p>Held out is a familiar palm: slight burn mark from a fried rice incident gone wrong; calluses from four long moving days; fingernails blunted from his last visit to Wonwoo’s apartment to get them clipped before the inevitable transpired soon after despite how shitty an excuse <em>nail clipping</em> is to get into bed with someone.</p><p>Based on the rustling noises, Mingyu must have stood up, too.</p><p>Wonwoo narrows his eyes, which he damn well knows Jun can sense even with the stupid sunglasses in the way.</p><p>“That’s right,” says Wonwoo, congenial through the audible grind to his teeth. He takes Jun’s hand in a <em>very </em>tight grip. “I’m Jeon Wonwoo. I wrote the script. The first version, at least.”</p><p>Jun squeezes the palm back and chuckles. “I know that much.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Turns out <em>this</em> was the “good news” Jun intended on sharing up until other…priorities got in the way. As much as Wonwoo adores Jun, this is some of the worst “good news” he’s heard all day.</p><p>“What do you mean?” asks Jun, frowning. “I thought you’d be happy that I booked a gig, let alone this one. My character has an actual name this time!”</p><p>In one of Wonwoo’s hands is a single paper plate with roughly two plates-worth of spring rolls; for being the leftovers, they aren’t half bad.</p><p>The other hand is pinching the skin between his tired, tired eyes. But recognizing Jun’s low-spirited expression does force an apologetic look out of Wonwoo.</p><p>“Of course I’m happy for you, that’s a given,” he says, “But you also know how I feel about keeping work and private life separate. This is my first big-screen writing job and I’m fast-walking on a track made of very expensive eggshells with these people.”</p><p>“You make it sound like I’m gonna do something wrong.”</p><p>“I wouldn’t put it past you.”</p><p>A small grin evolves on Jun’s face, the kind of smile that signals mischief he definitely shouldn’t commit to in a public space like this.</p><p>Just as Wonwoo is about to bite into a half-eaten spring roll, Jun plucks it from his fingers, bites it himself before snagging a quick smooch from Wonwoo’s open mouth. Suddenly alarmed, Wonwoo darts his eyes around them and, thankfully, finds no glaring attention towards them.</p><p>“What the hell are you doing?” Wonwoo hisses quickly, snatching the food back.</p><p>Jun’s lips gleam with oil. How dangerous. He says, “Let’s get into a little trouble.”</p><p>“Wen Junhui—”</p><p>“Ooh, my full name. I guess I’m already in trouble?”</p><p>The spark of anger behind Wonwoo’s eyes borders on a twisted hunger that food can’t satiate. Here is someone to do just that, apparently.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Long before this moment, Wen Junhui wasn’t much of an actor. Not that he is still much of one now, despite his shallow arguments otherwise. But it’s partly why Wonwoo was so drawn to him in the first place.</p><p>Junhui was an international university student from China, barely a grasp of Korean out of the plane but his goals for himself, like many who come here, were lofty. Inspired by K-pop idols with the same passport, he’d said, he hoped to find the same future. But real life doesn’t exactly mirror your Twitter feed.</p><p>Between Wonwoo and Soonyoung, the latter was the first to meet him through a dance club Jun only did because he needed to take his mind off the shitty auditions, even after shifting into acting. And, well, language wasn’t much of a barrier when it was all in the body. Such is a sentiment he continues to carry, especially having met and agreed to certain arrangements with Wonwoo.</p><p>Being in the same professional field, they understood each other’s woes. Being just an ink smudge in the encyclopedias of entertainment—especially when desiring more is your entire purview—makes desperation intimate, like a scratch in the innermost parts of who you are.</p><p>How Wonwoo and Jun process such woes is a different, but sometimes identical, story.</p><p>“Fuck,” Wonwoo curses. “<em>Fuck.”</em></p><p>Jun responds with a laugh-sigh before tasting the space beneath Wonwoo’s collarbone. Deft fingers dip below the band of Wonwoo’s jeans—payback for last time, most likely.</p><p>Wonwoo's sandals almost slide out from under him. Jun's Vans screech when he moves. The near constant banging of elbows and limbs against the bathroom stall walls only evidences that it’s much too small for two adult men to fit inside and do whatever business they’re to do. But the two of them have tended towards a philosophy of trying more often than not, given how much more enjoyable trying tends to end up being.</p><p>Wonwoo’s absurdly stupid sunglasses are hanging by the edge of his nose as Jun’s mouth works at the skin just skirting the barrier of Wonwoo’s collar, a challenge of how far he can lay his marks before a curious eye catches on. The pleasure and pain of the thought is still a weak distraction to the way Jun has wrapped around Wonwoo, fingertips daring to go further back than they have any right to go. Even with the near-numb of the warmth, Wonwoo has enough sobriety to be aware of all five points of pressure.</p><p>The other five? Wonwoo couldn’t give a rat’s ass about them. Jun could have them on fully himself or halfway through Wonwoo’s mouth and the target of this mess would be none the wiser. Surprisingly, it isn’t hard to discover the limits of a mind that never stops thinking.</p><p>Jun squeezes, <em>hard</em>, enough to make Wonwoo drop his forehead into the junction between Jun’s neck and shoulder to whine. Begrudgingly.</p><p>“We are <em>not </em>going that far,” Wonwoo seethes through his teeth. “Are you listening to me? I swear, if you pull the foreigner card again—”</p><p>“You’re always so worried.”</p><p>“One of us has to be!”</p><p>The inevitable statement, betrayed by pleasure, is soon followed by the inevitable response:</p><p>“It’s not like we’re famous enough for it to matter. Right?”</p><p>Wonwoo pushes his tongue to the roof of his mouth to cushion whatever noise comes out of him when Jun’s mischievous fingers turn arrogant.</p><p>For as much as Wonwoo wants to protest, Jun isn’t wrong. That response is frequent for a reason despite humble origins; it was an offhand, post-coital comment from a quick fuck after another one of Wonwoo’s stints as an extra who never made it past editing.</p><p>Back then, Wonwoo was opposed to the idea of settling for less than what he believed he could achieve during university. And then life happened—with its plastic palm fronds and barely-surviving idol groups who definitely needed scripts to be any form of entertaining—to temper the ambition of a young adult once wrapped in talk of talent.</p><p>But that ambition isn’t extinguished. Completely. Wonwoo will grasp threads of opportunity he’s given, even if his hands are tied and he has to break his jaw to bite it.</p><p>“Wonwoo? Hyung?”</p><p>Before he can shove Jun off to finish the job himself, Wonwoo hears the creak of a door. And the brief lapse of outside activity. And then silence, followed by the padding of shoes on bathroom tile.</p><p>“Are you in here?” asks Mingyu, lisp like a ghost in his words. “I think I saw you head here during lunch and you haven’t been out in a while. Are you alright?”</p><p>To Jun’s credit and still-intact (however waning) common sense, Wonwoo sees his eyes widen in understanding. But as Jun retracts his hand, the friction between a rough palm and sensitive skin nearly drags a sound out of Wonwoo—except for the glaring fact that the very centerpiece of his soon-to-be claim to fame is only a few steps away. The stall door separating them is as flimsy as their workplace relationship.</p><p>Wonwoo’s grip on Jun’s wrist is vice. Jun swallows, and stays.</p><p>Carefully, Wonwoo says, “I’m fine,” with a breathiness unintentional and something he will berate himself later for. He’s an <em>actor</em>, too, damn it. “It’s been a long day and I needed space to myself.”</p><p>“Am I, um, interrupting? Your alone time?”</p><p>Jun’s eyes-smile is undeserved. Wonwoo’s glare is glacial.</p><p>“Anything I’d say would sound like a lie,” Wonwoo responds more evenly. “So I would like to be left to my devices. If you need something, say it quickly so I can answer quickly.”</p><p>Wonwoo can feel the flinch on the other side of the stall door. <em>Don’t be mean</em>, Jun mouths, which is met with an icy scowl to match.</p><p>“Oh, uh,” Mingyu clears his throat, puffs out his chest, Wonwoo imagines. “I had some practice runs with Seungcheol and Jihoon earlier. We read through a few scenes over lunch. Still rough around the edges, they’d said, but also I was much better than last time. I just, well, thought you should know. Since I was thinking of you—well, your acting for Chunghee, that is. And you’re my acting coach now. So, thank you.”</p><p>Jun makes the same twisted face he makes whenever he scrolls through Instagram accounts of dogs or Vine compilations on Youtube of children being adorable. It’s almost sacrilegious, given their positions.</p><p>With the empathy audacious enough to sprout in his chest, Wonwoo responds, “Someone once told me that results aren’t reaped without hard work. Regardless, you’re welcome.”</p><p>A laughing sound echoes like a word of gratitude. It’s strangely relieving. Out of all the people to stumble inside, Wonwoo supposes that Kim Mingyu wasn’t the worst option.</p><p>“I look forward to our next session,” says Mingyu with a smile to his voice. “See you soon, hyung.”</p><p>He quickly shuffles out of the bathroom, probably still in those athleisure sponsorship shoes by the sound. After the click of the door, Wonwoo mentally counts to ten, very slowly, before wresting Jun’s hand from his pants with a barely-muffled groan. God, he would’ve crumpled under the embarrassment if Mingyu heard.</p><p>“You know, I was half-expecting him to greet me,” Jun murmurs, abso-<em>fucking</em>-lutely tickled pink. “Now <em>that</em> would have been hilarious.”</p><p>“Endangerment of our careers by sexual deviance is certainly peak comedy,” mutters Wonwoo, “Now put your dick back in your pants before I bite it off. And I mean that as a legitimate, non-sexual threat.”</p><p>“Denying it makes it sound sexual.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s very irked silence makes Jun chuckle. The latter knows when a dead flame shouldn’t be rekindled.</p><p>Wonwoo rearranges himself with mute fury—well, that’s how he would react, initially, to shenanigans like this. He won’t give any secret onlookers the pleasure of more noise. But a partnership like this also takes two to play, so the shame should be equally shared.</p><p>And yet, something about how quiet Mingyu sounded, much unlike how he was before, makes something in Wonwoo’s face muscles prickle, like acupuncture needles for a tautness conventional medicine can’t cure. What expression accompanied all the things Mingyu spoke of? How did he look when Wonwoo said what he said about working hard?</p><p>Finding such thoughts impractical, Wonwoo tucks them away to focus on the real concern at hand.</p><p>Between his own fingers, Wonwoo takes Jun’s: slightly crooked from labor during his non-acting jobs; flat, pink beds for fingernails he still bites sometimes; a jade ring on his pinky, which he never seems to take off. <em>A gift from my mother</em>, was the explanation over whiskey and failed audition stories. <em>To remind me of home. When I needed to remember where I started. </em>That night, Wonwoo took Jun to his apartment. He doesn’t know why the memory is surfacing now.</p><p>When Wonwoo squeezes their intertwined hands, Jun squeezes back. He always does. Differences in language have rarely hindered Jun from putting enough pieces together to understand.</p><p>“Well, who said the benefits in ‘friends with benefits’ always had to be sex, anyway?” Jun says, sighing as he stares at their fingers with a longing Wonwoo understands. “God knows I’ll miss it, though.”</p><p>Wonwoo chuckles. “Of course you will, horny asshole. And you know I’ll miss this, too. Maybe we can still have our fun now and then. But we have work to do and we can’t have emergencies like this happening again. Here.”</p><p>“With that wannabe idol-actor, I’m sure you do have work to do.”</p><p>“<em>We</em>. I said what I said,” Wonwoo corrects. “Your character has a name this time, doesn’t he?”</p><p>“That he does,” Jun assents, stance filling out with renewed pride. “Well, if you ever feel that itch, my arms—and legs—are open. I’d never say no to you.”</p><p>“As distasteful as that was, it would be difficult for me to not return the sentiment.”</p><p>“Oh Jeon Wonwoo, you’re <em>such</em> a hopeless romantic,” Jun swoons against the stall wall. “How have I not fallen for you yet?”</p><p>It would be a lie to say the question hasn’t come up in Wonwoo’s mind before.</p><p>But now isn’t the time for that, not in here, at least. Wonwoo still gives in to the smile, though. It’s a rare display outside of private moments like this.</p><p>He kisses Jun’s sealed lips, says, “It’s hard to fall in love with mirrors.”</p><p>Jun offers a single “ha,” glancing at a point past Wonwoo’s face before saying, “You say this now, Jeon Wonwoo.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">What do you expect from this?</p>
  <p>JAESANG doesn’t say anything. Other students and people mill around them.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">To go to nationals?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">That’s a given. Outside of it being fun, why else if not success? But, then again, the way you say it makes it sound...</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Uncertain.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Like it’s not your first priority. Which is strange, for someone like you.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">What do you mean “someone like me”?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I...well, you’re always moving. You have an energy to you, even in the live-streamed games, if the fans you’ve accumulated are any indication. I sort of just...assumed you wanted to be rewarded for all that moving. Maybe with a gold trophy and some medals.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Well, I wouldn’t say no to that.</p>
  <p>Zooming on JAESANG’s face shows he is deep in thought. Then he looks at CHUNGHEE, who looks back at him.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Competition was everything to me growing up. But I also want to find something outside of that.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">...and you’re doing that by continuing to play in a competitive sport.</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE is grinning slightly, which JAESANG reflects more brightly.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I’m working on it, you know.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I’m sure you are. So if nationals aren’t your first priority, then what is?</p>
  <p>JAESANG laughs awkwardly and looks down at the volleyball in his lap. The marker initials in his mother’s handwriting suggest this is the same volleyball he had in high school.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">That’s. Well. You probably wouldn’t believe me if I told you.</p>
</div><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Welcome all aboard the WW Ship Train (don’t ask about the logistics of a ship train). I just want him to be surrounded by love 24/7, I swear.</p><p>Oh man, how is this new workplace "relationship" going to pan out? Is WonHui really out of the picture? And now there's history (again lol) with Joshua motherfuckin <i>Hong?</i> 👀<br/> <br/>Find me on <a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com">tumblr</a> if you wanna gossip about The Drama</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>It started innocently enough with the label of a soju bottle, one that tasted dangerously like fruit punch through the undertones of nail polish remover.</p><p>Then it happened again, on the fried chicken box and beer Wonwoo and Soonyoung always order for their biweekly movie nights.</p><p>By the time Wonwoo sees that begrudgingly familiar tan skin and the gleaming, whitened canine grin stark against the brick wall of the barbecue restaurant he treats Jun to one night, Wonwoo has just about <em>had it.</em></p><p>“You’re usually so observant. I’m surprised you’re only noticing this now,” Jun had said, face the color of apples and close to passing out, but he always has the energy to tease. “He’s like the new Suzy.”</p><p>“Wow, that is a bold statement to make, Wen Junhui.”</p><p>“Is it? I thought that was why he was cast.”</p><p>“Well, that’s,” Wonwoo had grappled with the words in his mouth. “I don’t think that’s the only reason.”</p><p>Bold statements aside, it really is uncanny how many times he starts seeing Mingyu in everyday life.</p><p>Not Mingyu himself, per se, but his face. And voice. And his mood ring array of hair colors adorning everything from billboards of Laneige’s new lip mask to mid-tier beer and perfume brands. He’s even the main character in Yoo Kihyun’s recent summer romance single.</p><p>As a long-time Kihyun fan, imagine Wonwoo’s surprise seeing Kim Mingyu press his forehead against the cute actress whose indie film last year was one of Wonwoo’s favorites. Whatever real emotions came after the whiplash, Wonwoo can’t say, but tired is probably somewhere in there.</p><p><em>“I’m just so grateful to here,”</em> Mingyu says sheepishly to the behind-the-scenes camera next to his leading lady. <em>“I’ve been a fan of Yoo Kihyun’s music for a while, so this was like a dream come true. Oh, yes, I’ve met him already! He’s very nice and actually quite cheeky—”</em></p><p>Wonwoo shuts his phone off and smacks it onto his bedside table. Guess he won’t be listening to that song any time soon, lest Mingyu’s celebrated visage bleed into Wonwoo’s personal life. Like an unprofessional. Which Wonwoo certainly is not.</p><p>It <em>would</em> be remiss to say Mingyu was anything but, well, handsome. The warmth inherent, whether through complexion or company, is proof of some universal sort of appeal. It’s a little a sad to think he really is better off with a solo career.</p><p>“Why do you think that is?” Wonwoo had pondered aloud on a movie night, muffled by the chicken in his mouth and some cliché confession scene on screen. “His success?”</p><p>Soonyoung half-shrugged with his gulp of beer. “Young, hot. Not an asshole. Chivalry’s got low standards these days.”</p><p>Wonwoo didn’t respond to that. Truth rarely needs confirmation.</p><p>In seeing Kim Mingyu saturating daily Korean life, Wonwoo realizes where his confusion grows.</p><p>An industry that cultivates, packages, and sells intimacy like a consumable doesn’t favor the warm, or tender, or soft. It’s a crop field not meant for fruit—which is saccharine, but lacks longevity.</p><p>And yet Mingyu <em>is</em> warm. He <em>is</em> tender. He <em>is</em> soft. And he isn’t going away any time soon, as far as Wonwoo is concerned.</p><p>Past the airbrushed posters and concealer, Wonwoo returns to the lines etched around Mingyu’s lips, his eyes. Mingyu lets his smile lines stay as if they are meant to be worn. His voice is easy, and that’s not to say he isn’t loud. But even the sharpest letters are sanded down when he speaks, like rocks to pebbles in a running riverbed.</p><p>For all the unquiet in Mingyu’s body, there is a strange quiet to him as well. He’s a paradox embodied—like any normal human being, Wonwoo supposes. He wonders if that has anything to do with Mingyu’s old life, the one buried under the carpet of new fame.</p><p>Would it be childish for Wonwoo to say he’s jealous? If Wonwoo worked harder and didn’t settle for scripted variety, attacked auditions with a starving vigor like he did in the past, would he have reached Mingyu’s level of fame? Instead of being another faceless, nameless person outside the spotlight?</p><p><em>Results aren’t reaped without hard work.</em> That’s what he had told Mingyu.</p><p>Picking up his phone again, Wonwoo sees his reflection in the black screen. Hard work does have its limits, he supposes.</p><p>He knows he isn’t being productive, doing this. But he is only human. He still feels things, thinks things, as much as he hates to succumb to them during restless nights like this.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p>FADE IN:</p>
  <p>EXT. GYMNASIUM - MORNING</p>
  <p>JAESANG arrives at the gym yawning and a half-finished coffee in hand. He sees and catches some of CHUNGHEE’s conversation with two female students at the gym’s door.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Like I said, he isn’t here yet</p>
  <p class="character">GIRL #1</p>
  <p class="dialogue">SUNGHOON said—</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I know what SUNGHOON said, but he doesn’t know his teamor JAESANG as well as I do. Besides, JAESANG is probably going to be late—</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">What’s this about JAESANG being late?</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE stops talking and the girls make sounds of excitement. CHUNGHEE sighs.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Speak of the devil. Well, looks like you’ve got some admirers.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Oh. Wait. Me?</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE rolls his eyes, waves a hand vaguely before heading back inside.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">You’ve got five minutes before practice starts, Mister Celebrity.</p>
</div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“I can’t believe you have to deal with this daily.”</p><p>“It’s really not that bad. I’ve seen <em>far</em> worse.”</p><p>Wonwoo raises his brows at Chaeyeon, who responds with an airy gesticulation towards what is, admittedly, an unremarkable interaction between Mingyu and some fans. No doubt Jeonghan encouraged putting today’s practice on Mingyu’s public calendar. Free marketing is good marketing, after all.</p><p>“The fans from his idol days sort of run the show. Lots of noonas, older fansite managers,” explains Chaeyeon, standing beside Wonwoo from the entrance of the training center. Mingyu is just beyond, across the street with far less security than is expected for the new face of too many alcohol brands. “So at least there’s some order to what would usually be a chaotic mess for most soloists.”</p><p>“I’m surprised they haven’t pulled his limbs off for auction yet.”</p><p>“He is quite known for them, isn’t he? Knock on wood, I suppose.”</p><p>“As long as they’re on his person throughout filming and promotions,” says Wonwoo, rolling his shoulders with the tautness of the morning hour. “When he’s done wasting my time, tell him I’ll be in the second break room. Turns out we do have enough budget to not practice in the stairwell.”</p><p>Chaeyeon’s music box laughter is the last thing Wonwoo hears as he heads to exactly where he stated he would be.</p><p>Punctuality is a virtue, he will argue to his grave, but that doesn’t mean he can’t appreciate the gift of solitude when it’s given. Considering how often he’s…encountered Mingyu up until this point, Wonwoo needs the peace.</p><p><em>How can I look him in the eye when all I can see is that shitty toothpaste commercial?</em> Wonwoo rubs his temples and groans. Working with subpar celebrities with little to no marketing power was a blessing he didn’t appreciate enough.</p><p>“Hyung, sorry I’m late—oh. Do you have a headache? I think Chae has—”</p><p>Wonwoo immediately straightens himself out. His gaze pins to the intricate silver and gem buckle of Mingyu’s belt, but then he decides that that’s probably not the best place for his eyes to rest.</p><p>“Clocks exist for a reason,” says Wonwoo, moving from expensive belt to oddly bare wrists.</p><p>“Oh?” replies Mingyu, lips twitching as he passes through and closes the door of the break room behind him. “Do tell.”</p><p>“They can help you show up to places on time. And they don’t have to be read by just managers.”</p><p>“What if you get distracted?”</p><p>“That’s more of a problem with your diligence rather than reading skills.”</p><p>“Too bad you’re not a coach for that either, then,” says Mingyu, grinning. He pulls up a chair whose drag of metal legs is raucous on polished wood. “I really am sorry for being late, though. I had, well, I guess you already know.”</p><p>“You can apologize by focusing on your performance, lover boy.”</p><p>Mingyu scoffs without venom.</p><p>“Start from the top of page thirty-seven,” Wonwoo orders, lips forced flat, “Where we left off last time.”</p><p>Mingyu hooks one probably-insured leg over the other with the same, modest curve to his mouth Wonwoo has seen far too many iterations of outside this room.</p><p>“Yes, sir.”</p><p>Something about the way Mingyu says that doesn’t sit well with Wonwoo.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p>EXT. GYMNASIUM - AFTERNOON</p>
  <p>JAESANG, last to leave the gym and hair wet, closes the door behind him. He curses after realizing he does not have the key to lock up. A cough behind him prompts JAESANG to see CHUNGHEE twirling the gym key around his finger.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Must be nice, talking to some cute girls, taking your sweet time in the showers after practice, and making me wait for you to finish so I can be responsible.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">...I’m sensing some animosity.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">How many receives did you flub today again?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">There’s! There’s...a lot on my mind, okay?</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE gently pushes past so he can start locking the door. JAESANG leans against the wall and watches.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">You’ve been in my position before, right? Having fans?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">JAESANG, I was in <em>high school</em>. High school is not college.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">So? You don’t, er, didn’t like having fans?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">What am I supposed to say to that? That I didn’t like them?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Them? Them as in the girls from earlier? Or...?</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE finishes locking the door with a loud click before looking at JAESANG, who looks surprised.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Give yourself enough credit, JAESANG. You’re hardly just a fan anymore.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG (voiceover)</p>
  <p class="dialogue">My throat tightened when he said that, with those intense eyes. I couldn’t say anything. Even off the court, CHUNGHEE always makes me speechless somehow.</p>
</div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“You sound like you’re reading,” says Wonwoo, forcing down a mild scowl, “Which wouldn’t be happening if you memorized these scenes like I told you to.”</p><p>Mingyu sighs like he’d expected this feedback, which makes Wonwoo’s fingers tighten around his note-taking pen—with which he has taken quite a few notes.</p><p>“I know, I know, sorry. Let me try again. ” Mingyu admits, skin pinched between his eyebrows in a rare display of annoyance. “Ahem, ‘So you, um, didn’t like your fans? I-I mean, having them?’”</p><p>Imperfect, but fine. Stutters can pass.</p><p>Wonwoo does his best to recreate his mind’s eye Chunghee. He pushes gentler the sharpness of his gaze, tense jaw more lax. The precursor of a laugh is painted on his cheeks and the edges of his mouth.</p><p>“'What am I supposed to say to that?'” Wonwoo sighs. “'That I didn’t like them?'”</p><p>“‘Them, as in the girls from earlier? Or…?’”</p><p>“‘Give yourself enough credit, Jaesang. You’re hardly just a fan anymore.’”</p><p>There is an audible swallow, and then:</p><p>“‘My throat tightened. When he said that, with those intense eyes. I, I couldn’t say anything—’”</p><p>Wonwoo sighs. “Mingyu—”</p><p>“<em>Damn it.” </em>An exhale trickles out Mingyu’s throat.“It sucked. I know. I <em>know. </em>No need to tell me.”</p><p>And so Wonwoo doesn’t, as much as he knows he really should. Mingyu makes a whining noise.</p><p>“Can I be honest with you, hyung?”</p><p>Wonwoo sets his pen down, neatly crosses his arms and legs. “If it helps you get back on track, you’re welcome to.”</p><p>“You see, once I know the lines. I <em>know </em>them, you know?” says Mingyu, insistent, “But memorizing these scenes takes time for me. A lot of time. I’m still new to all this so I can’t do it that fast yet. And I’ve been so <em>swamped</em> the past few days that I just haven’t had the chance to sit down with the script like I want to! My managers’ve been trying to get our higher-ups to reduce my workload, but no one’s listening! It’s so frustrating! No matter what we say, to them, the film still looks like…like, erm, well…”</p><p>“A side project.”</p><p>Mingyu’s frustration immediately turns apologetic.</p><p>“I’ve been told the same,” Wonwoo continues, “while scripting for variety shows and writing this in my free time.”</p><p>“I’m sorry.”</p><p>“Why are you sorry?”</p><p>Wonwoo surprises himself with the gentility of the question. He hasn’t shaken Chunghee off completely, perhaps.</p><p>Mingyu opens his mouth to say reassurances, probably along the lines of <em>Because you worked hard to write it</em> or <em>Even if my company’s not serious, I am. About this.</em></p><p>“I don’t think,” Mingyu starts instead. “I don’t think being called a ‘side project’ should make the project any less important.”</p><p>“I sure hope so, especially considering how much my ‘side project’ has escalated.”</p><p>“You don’t seem like the type of person to look for overtly grand things.”</p><p>Wonwoo chuckles dryly. “You’d be surprised. Talkativeness, or lack thereof, isn’t indicative of ambition.”</p><p>“Good point.” Mingyu pauses for thought. “Well, even if your work were to be small-scale, it would still mean a lot, right? To you? I guess that’s what I mean.”</p><p>Wonwoo bites his lip obedient. In the silence, he picks up his pen to distract from it—click, click, click, <em>click</em>—before setting it down again.</p><p>Then, “May I ask you a question, Mister Kim?”</p><p>“Mingyu is just fine—”</p><p>“Why did you agree to take this movie?”</p><p>At that, Mingyu says nothing for a long while, either. Thoughts are evident in his expressions, but none are particularly easy to pick out for someone typically more expressive. Such might also be Wonwoo’s teaching.</p><p>Stranger is fact that Mingyu doesn’t bother setting conditions before Wonwoo does something so bold as to ask a clearly personal (or legal) question. Quick trust is quite the double-edged sword in this business.</p><p>Carefully, a response arrives:</p><p>“I resonated with the story. I felt seen, reading it.”</p><p>Well, that—wasn’t the answer Wonwoo was expecting.</p><p>The first part, sure, Chaeyeon said something adjacent when she and Wonwoo first met. But the follow-up statement sparks a fire in Wonwoo’s mind.</p><p>But what does Mingyu <em>mean?</em> “Seen”? In what way? In which parts? Through which characters? Which relationships? What would happen if Mingyu answered that question to someone driven less by validation and more by gossip and fame? When one question arises, it is soon erased by another, and another, and another.</p><p>Praise isn’t unfamiliar to Wonwoo; churn out enough content and something is bound to hit. But physically hearing it for something he solely made, from the mouth of an actual human being and so simply spoken feels...different.</p><p>“I’m glad you feel that way,” Wonwoo says.</p><p>“You’re...not going to ask me to, I don’t know, elaborate?”</p><p>Wonwoo’s face twists. “While the sentiment is certainly appreciated, your interest sounds private, which isn’t my business to pry into. I know boundaries when I see them. I apologize for interrupting practice with a trivial question.”</p><p>Well. That definitely sounded stilted. Wonwoo waits for Mingyu’s laugh or some soothe-saying word to smooth the awkwardness brought forth this time.</p><p>And he does get as much, with the cheerful, disbelieving sound that comes out of Mingyu. “You’re such an interesting hyung.”</p><p>“You keep calling me that.”</p><p>“Yes. Oh, um, does that make you uncomfortable?”</p><p>“Not, not exactly,” says Wonwoo, looking askance. “It's just that we haven’t known each other very long, even when considering that variety show you were on. Back then.”</p><p>Mingyu looks thoughtful, as if mulling over something distant.</p><p>“I dunno, I guess ‘hyung’ feels better than 'sunbae.’ In any case, we have lots of time in the future to make up for it, right?”</p><p>“Right.”</p><p>“Can I ask you a question, too?”</p><p>Wonwoo visibly hesitates, maybe in the way Mingyu should have been. Then again, it’s not like Wonwoo has an image to protect by comparison. It’s only fair to allow this much.</p><p>So he waves a hand. <em>Go on.</em></p><p>“Is this movie based on your own life?”</p><p><em>That</em>, Wonwoo foresaw. Any story with two men tap-dancing very distinctly on one side of the line between “friends” and “more than friends” is bound to raise eyebrows. Wonwoo usually sidesteps with some bullshit about artistic expression, defying the gender essentialism of mainstream Korean media and blah blah blah.</p><p>But seeing the unimposing, if not eager language of Mingyu’s body, in remembering the honesty and weight of Mingyu’s response just moments prior, Wonwoo tastes the words dissolving in his mouth.</p><p>He tells himself something about investing in honesty, in yielding greater returns and other practical rhetoric about calculating his words for a beneficial outcome.</p><p>So, slowly and with effort, Wonwoo says, “Yes, it is. More or less.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>(Wonwoo first saw Joshua Hong in an American independent film.</p><p>It was a strange, vibrant scrapbook of video clips documenting a cluster of Asian-American friends on this grand, tail-to-tip roadtrip across the country. It was an exploration of intimacy and exploration itself, defining your personal identities, finding meaning in cultural ties while simultaneously being in the middle of nowhere. Joshua played a college dropout who struggled with his endless capacity for love and the fragile heart bred from it.</p><p>When the boy, from a payphone in the middle of the Arizona desert, called his parents to say both “I love you” and “I’m sorry for not being who you wanted me to be”—Wonwoo cried. Truly, he did. It was the first time he’d ever really cried watching a movie.</p><p>Since then, Wonwoo did his best to closely follow Joshua Hong’s filmography, ranging from small cameos in mainstream romcom television to powdered milk commercials to bigger speaking roles in low-budget experimental films that didn’t make any damn sense but <em>god </em>were they beautiful to look at.</p><p>Joshua never failed to leave behind an impression, like a trail of crumbs to the next joy or heartache Wonwoo anticipated experiencing again, if only in slightly different ways.</p><p>So you can imagine how absolutely <em>flabbergasting</em> it was to walk into his very first class in university—Acting Theory 101, despite its unoriginal title—to find Joshua Hong himself sitting all prim and kind at the front of the room, next to the professor, and introduced as the course preceptor. Wonwoo didn’t dare speak at all that first class, or even the second. He feared what embarrassing truths might slip through attempts at normal speech.</p><p>Silence eventually evolved into an excuse to just watch, really.</p><p>For all the grace in the very breaths Joshua breathed, his acting was always robust, intentional, and manifested all the way to even his fingertips. In fact, most would focus on a face in scenes of suspense; it’s natural to seek the most identifiably human parts of someone in the most dire of moments. But during a demonstration of the Stanislavski Method, Wonwoo caught sight of Joshua’s hands practically stapled to his sides, so incredibly tense that a rock thrown at them would probably slice in half.</p><p>In that moment, Wonwoo felt the urge to hold those hands. To help them relax and find comfort in being held. It was a scary thought to have of a superior who learned Wonwoo’s name by course registrar.</p><p>And yet, somehow, they started seeing each other.</p><p>It was friendly enough at the start: rarely-occupied office hours except for one; discussing possible paper topics at length; fighting for extra points in those papers only to gain a smile of firmness and apology. It may not have helped his grades, but it was comforting enough to see, at least.</p><p>“Why do I even ask?” Wonwoo had joked aloud.</p><p>“Because as quiet as you are, you’re also persistent,” responded Joshua, obviously humored. “I like that. One of these days, maybe I’ll give in.”</p><p>And he did.</p><p>One day, Wonwoo threw out the question of a date poorly disguised as an excuse:</p><p>“There are Take Your Professor to Lunches, right? Why not teaching fellows?”</p><p>“You know it’s different.”</p><p>“How? I feel like I’ve learned more from you than the professor at this point—”</p><p>A boisterous laugh followed, closely shadowed by some curious but fleeting looks their way in the hallway of the performing arts building. Wonwoo was about to drown in the heat of his own flush, but Joshua hasn’t rejected him yet, so—</p><p>“Geez, what sort of monster have I made out of you?” Joshua had said, chuckling almost silently. He patted Wonwoo’s shoulder in what would be a friendly gesture if not for the protracted weight. “Fine. Only if I get to pick where.”</p><p>As much of a teacher’s pet Wonwoo was in high school, he couldn’t give two damns about the roles he and Joshua played in their respective lives: one teacher, the other student. Class walls disappeared as restaurant brick and grills replaced them—more so when alcohol was on the table.</p><p>One shared shot of soju after another, Wonwoo felt this overwhelming rush of desire. He had always admired Joshua’s ability to cultivate those parts of himself for the sake of a real performance. But seeing it all there, encompassed fully in a singular individual beneath a plain cardigan and ripped jeans and pink-cheeked smile that should be against Wonwoo’s—it was a lot. It felt a lot. Too much.</p><p>A hand laid on top of his.</p><p>“Penny for your thoughts?” Joshua had asked.</p><p>“I think I like you,” Wonwoo had said, like he wished he hadn’t said it at all. “I’m sorry.”</p><p>“Why are you sorry?”</p><p><em>Because now you’re burdened</em>. <em>Because you deserve more than someone who only became serious about acting now. </em>Wonwoo caged the answers in his throat, and in seeing this, Joshua smiles.</p><p>“You have so much potential,” he said. “You really do.”</p><p>Wonwoo thought Joshua was simply switching gears from the awkwardness. In retrospect, that was not the case.</p><p>Joshua didn’t reject him; their first night together implied as much. Instead, oddly enough, it sounded like an apology empty of the words of one.)</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>With physical training inching towards closure, actual filming lies on the horizon. Jihoon had requested some film tests for a few key scenes. More specifically, he wanted to see perhaps one of the most iconic parts of the story.</p><p>After a persistent month, Jaesang has successfully chipped away at Chunghee’s resolve to not interact unnecessarily outside practice—at least, on the condition that Jaesang would practice his receives during such off-the-book hours. With Chunghee. Alone in the gym.</p><p>“‘How the hell did you survive high school volleyball with that form of yours?’” Seungcheol as Chunghee is firmly wedged between mature despair and amusement. His hold on Mingyu’s arms is purposeful, pushing them into place with a surety of someone who knows what he’s doing. “‘I’ve told you to straighten your elbows at least a dozen times and you never listen. I swear, I’m doing you a favor by making you do these extra drills after practice.’”</p><p>Mingyu bows his head despite the grin on his face. “‘I guess you are, hyung. Honestly, I probably wouldn’t be doing them if you weren’t here. Ah! Um, I mean…’”</p><p>“Stop! Stop the cameras,” calls out Jihoon from his directing chair.</p><p>Everyone, from the cameramen to the boom operators to Wonwoo and Jun observing from a dark corner of the room, startles with surprise. The absence of a microphone doesn’t stop the director’s high-toned voice from resonating with gripping clarity.</p><p>“Kim Mingyu,” Jihoon says like it’s a scold, “You look too satisfied with yourself. This is the first time Jaesang is alone with Chunghee, and Chunghee’s <em>hands</em> are on him! You need to be more anxious. You sound like you’re just pretending—which isn’t the same as acting.”</p><p>A common phrase from him, and yet the sour cadence of it makes even Wonwoo wince.</p><p>Swallowing hard, Mingyu nods at the director. Jihoon shouts for resumption.</p><p>The cycle begins again: sound staff and cameramen at the ready; Jihoon’s assistant counting down with the adjusted clapperboard; breaths bated for the first line delivery by one handsome co-lead to the other. If Wonwoo’s eyes seem particularly trained on Mingyu, Jun has the courtesy to not comment on it.</p><p>Even from a distance, no doubt, Kim Mingyu was <em>made</em> for television. Stunning and proportioned beyond compare, grin dangerously disarming, very strong intuition for when and where to inject charm or humor or empathy into a conversation. Just earlier, his long-time stylist and makeup artist—Minghao?—was embroiled in a rather nasty fight with on-site hair and makeup just to get Mingyu undressed <em>in private, you nosy motherfuckers</em> for today’s test film. Even Wonwoo will admit some disappointment in the Internet’s dearth of shirtless photos.</p><p>But Mingyu is an amateur at the end of the day with muscle memory still firmly latched to his first craft.</p><p>“Stop<em>, </em>stop, <em>stop,”</em> Jihoon groans again.</p><p>The director’s patience was already remarkable, given his infamous intolerance for novices in big roles. But Jihoon also knows the importance of setting the tone for the next many months—which isn’t happening at this rate.</p><p>He snatches the megaphone from his assistant and calls out: “Wonwoo? Jeon Wonwoo? Where are you?”</p><p>More than two dozen eyes find the new man of the hour. Panic arises in he whose legal name is exactly that.</p><p>Jun doesn’t even have the chance to squeeze Wonwoo’s arm before the scriptwriter—or acting coach, in this case—walks forward to his bat signal.</p><p>“Whatever pep talk you gave Mingyu earlier,” Jihoon tells him, “do it again. This scene’s pretty damn important to get right, even if we’re just doing tests today. And the rest of you! Are you all children? No? Then stop gawking! We’re on break for fifteen minutes and they better be damn productive!”</p><p>The murmuring buzz cuts out in a collective flinch. Wonwoo is glad about that much.</p><p>Indeed, this scene really <em>is</em> important, he knows—and Mingyu knows this, too. He even gushed over it when he first read through it and seemed adequate enough during his and Wonwoo’s one-on-one sessions.</p><p>For a person who draws eyes on instinct, what could possibly be making Mingyu so nervous?</p><p>“Mingyu—”</p><p>“I know I know I <em>know</em>. Please. You don’t have to tell me.”</p><p>He really does hate hearing his name said like that—like the start of bad news.</p><p>With all the managerial energy of Chaeyeon Wonwoo can muster, he asserts, “I <em>do</em> have to tell you. You’re not going to get better unless someone does, and clearly Jihoon’s words aren’t having much of an effect.”</p><p>“I’m trying, I promise—”</p><p>“I know you are,” Wonwoo says as forgiving as he can afford here, “But you’re not thinking before doing. You’re great at bouncing back, I’ll give you that. But your efforts are in vain if you don’t figure out what went wrong and actually do something to fix it.”</p><p>In the corners of his eyes, Wonwoo catches staff busying themselves in work. Looks fake. How appropriate, seeing where the real acting degrees manifest themselves here.</p><p>“Is it the touching that makes you nervous?” Wonwoo asks. “That’s a big obstacle for many on-screen couples, especially when they’re working together for the first time. Think of it like holding hands with a fan. Granted, your co-lead is as masculine as they come, but I’m sure you’ve had male fans one time or another.”</p><p>“I, yes, well.” Mingyu’s Adam’s apple bobs up and down. “The, the touching does make me a little skittish. I’m not great with, erm, people I’m not that close with? But don’t tell sunbae that! And, uh, in any case, I really don’t think I can imagine him as a tiny Korean girl in a floral dress and braided hair.”</p><p>“Is that a…a common trend in your fanbase?”</p><p>“A joke interview answer may have been taken a little <em>too</em> seriously.”</p><p>A snort escapes Wonwoo before he can help it. The ugly sound of it would be mortifying if not for the softening at Mingyu’s jaw, between his brows. Better.</p><p>“I know you’ve been trained to make your idol schtick your default, especially when a camera’s around,” says Wonwoo, riding the advantage, “But you need to let go of that. Don’t gloss over the skittish. Embrace it. Remember the vulnerability of this scene. Remember the last time you fell in love with someone, when you were alone with them for the very first time.”</p><p>Mingyu’s fixation on a vague, faraway point falters before holding on once more. Wonwoo bypasses biting the bullet entirely and swallows it whole.</p><p>“How did—and I can’t really find a better way to phrase this, so excuse my wording—in that moment, how did his…touch feel? How did <em>you</em> feel?”</p><p>Mingyu’s attention migrates like a hummingbird.</p><p>He looks at his manager and stylist in the nearest unlit corner, offering loudly quiet fist-pumps despite numerous phone calls about Mingyu’s next schedule. He looks at Seungcheol, who gives a patient smile that makes the makeup noona blotting his face sigh audibly.</p><p>And then, with strange effort, Mingyu’s gaze lands on Wonwoo, where it settles on still really nervous but also an inkling of understanding—which is so relieving <em>thank god</em> because if Mingyu hasn’t suffered through some iteration of love at least once in his life, Wonwoo would petition for a recast immediately before starting a different petition about giving people in entertainment some god damn breathing room.</p><p>“Do you have it?” Wonwoo asks. “Or…”</p><p>Mingyu says nothing. Again. It’s an annoying development Wonwoo can only blame himself for.</p><p>A palm is presented to him instead. Upturned, fingers spread wide and tense like Mingyu bracing for something to fall on top of them.</p><p>Too bad for him, Wonwoo has an Olympic tolerance for silence. Mingyu bites his lip.</p><p>“Can you…” he says eventually.</p><p>Wonwoo raises his eyebrows. “What?”</p><p>The offered hand wiggles a little. Jihoon yells a five-minute warning, followed by unanimous grunts of acknowledgement.</p><p>“I legitimately have no idea what you’re asking for.”</p><p>“Well, you kept saying stuff earlier so I thought—”</p><p>“I don’t recall asking for a handshake,” Wonwoo says, maybe even teases. It’s definitely more fun than it deserves to be. “Surely, words aren’t so difficult to use, Mister Kim.”</p><p>“Of course they can,” Mingyu says, nearly in whining territory. “You of all people would know that.”</p><p>“That’s—”</p><p>Wonwoo cuts himself off when the statement sinks, like weight in thick seawater. He does know that. Learned it a long time ago, when he was younger and more arrogant and thought words were easy. Like people, they are not.</p><p>Wonwoo certainly isn’t so daft as to not recognize what Mingyu is asking of him now.</p><p><em>Why not your manager? </em>Wonwoo could put forth. <em>Or your stylist? Or literally anyone else in your trusted ensemble, watching you request this of someone you barely know past a work relationship?</em></p><p>“You’re my coach, hyung. Please? Just. Just for this.”</p><p>If there is heat behind Wonwoo’s paper-thin veneer, he prays it doesn’t show. The quiver to Mingyu’s fingers is the only thing keeping Wonwoo from feeling wholly unqualified being here.</p><p>Three more minutes.</p><p>Before second-guessing traps him, Wonwoo places the tips of his fingers in Mingyu’s palm. He hears a held breath no longer held, after which Mingyu starts to curl his own fingers around Wonwoo’s.</p><p>Despite fully expecting it, the touch is still a shock in how different it must feel for either of them. Mingyu runs warm and Wonwoo the exact opposite. Warm-handed people are hard to trust because they trick Wonwoo into thinking that <em>he </em>is the source of heat—that he is the one warming someone else.</p><p>More than that, Mingyu’s hand looks child-like apart from the size; his fingers are more rounded beside Wonwoo’s thin, pointed, gangly-looking things. The tremble is still there, despite the grip.</p><p>And it’s rather, well, cute.</p><p>“I’d say I was holding an iced coffee to explain what must feel like algor mortis to you,” Wonwoo says lightly, “But those drinks rarely survive past half an hour of purchasing them and you definitely saw me demolish at least two this morning.”</p><p>The purse of Mingyu’s mouth releases like a popping soap bubble. It recollects into something more amenable to humor, which is much closer to the Mingyu Wonwoo imagined was cast for this role in the first place. It’s also great distraction for the way Mingyu’s fingers find their way between Wonwoo’s.</p><p>“I think you feel warm enough,” Mingyu says, completely straight-faced.</p><p>“Yah,” Wonwoo tries to snap, but his voice comes out quiet. “Don’t lie to me.”</p><p>“I’m not! I’m not, promise. To be honest, I’m more surprised you haven’t said anything about how clammy <em>my</em> hand feels. Almost pissed myself earlier when sunbae touched my elbow. I memorized that much of the script, at least, and elbow-touching definitely wasn’t on the agenda.”</p><p>“That’s called improv. Improv is a thing in acting.”</p><p>“He could’ve asked first.”</p><p>“Did you ask me if I was okay with your hand on my thigh during our first practice?”</p><p>Mingyu’s mouth flaps with sounds that aren’t words. A question about V-cards stays neatly tucked beneath Wonwoo’s tongue.</p><p>“That much suggested you were okay with skinship, but I suppose that isn’t necessarily true,” Wonwoo says instead. “I thought that was a pretty big thing for idols. Skinship.”</p><p>“Besides fan interactions—which I do enjoy, my fans really are the loveliest people—it’s not exactly my preference, at least until I get to know someone.”</p><p>“I see.” Wonwoo hates to leave it there, so he adds, without thinking, “We barely know each other.”</p><p>Perhaps, too, without thinking, Wonwoo feels a clammy squeeze around his hand that lingers as quickly as it disappears.</p><p>“Must be a testament to your excellent teaching then, hyung,” says Mingyu, affording a grin, “Or, er, coach?”</p><p>“Please tell me you practice <em>some</em> modicum of formality at your actual work place.”</p><p>“Modicum? Is that like a modest...In any case, this is my work place, too, you know.”</p><p>“I, <em>what</em>—” Wonwoo, face hot, visibly flounders. “You idiot, you know exactly what I mean, don’t you—”</p><p>It’s at this point that Mingyu’s evolving laughter is finally loud enough to hear above the ringing in Wonwoo’s ears.</p><p>“That’s it,” Wonwoo says, mouth shaping into a near-snarl. “‘Hyung’ is definitely off the table now.”</p><p>Mingyu’s eyes curl. “Aw, I was just kidding—”</p><p>“Break is over! Get your asses back on whatever the hell you’re supposed to be doing!” Jihoon’s voice almost seems to bounce around the room. “C’mon, chop chop! Kim Mingyu, this better be a one-shot wonder from all that yakking!”</p><p>Curiosity gravitating towards them once more, Wonwoo quickly retracts himself and stuffs whatever loose ends he’s generated into his pockets, where they strictly belong. He was careless for getting caught in the moment.</p><p>Wonwoo levels a look against Mingyu’s. It’s far too self-satisfied for whatever whimpering mess was holding up the schedule just earlier.</p><p>“No more ‘hyung’? For real?” Mingyu’s eyes are dancing, “Just when I thought we were actually getting to know each other.”</p><p>Automatic, Wonwoo’s face twists into a grimace. <em>Playing around with me, huh? The overconfidence of rookies is a damn </em>sight<em> to behold.</em></p><p>Then, dryly: “Shut up and get to work already. Some of us have other things to do after this.”</p><p>It’s a poor argument by all accounts, considering the work schedule of the person Wonwoo is addressing. Nonetheless, Mingyu’s huff is bracketed by a smile. The force of it seems to force strand or two of gelled hair out of place, neither of which are fixed when Mingyu strides onto set once more.</p><p>At least his posture seems better. From afar.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“Good lord, I thought that was never going to <em>end</em>,” groans Chaeyeon into the face of her phone. “Ah shit balls, we’re already twenty minutes into his fansign. Let me make some calls. Again, Christ…”</p><p>Her mutters sound extremely tart while walking away. It’s a stark contrast from her sweet negotiation of schedules with Wonwoo just earlier. Minghao simply adjusts Mingyu’s hair and makeup, much of which has sloughed off throughout the day.</p><p>Wonwoo says, “Never would’ve imagined those words coming out of her.”</p><p>Minghao snorts. “Chae’s an absolute peach most days. Then there’re times when the horns come out and, honestly, good for her. She’s had to deal with celebrity schmucks her entire professional career and still thinks it’s a job worth staying in.”</p><p>He sharply brushes out a tangle in Mingyu’s hair before one such schmuck can file a complaint. Jun snickers behind his hand.</p><p>Mingyu’s eyes seem to trail the noise, flickering across Jun’s presence near Wonwoo’s before landing back on somewhere indistinct. Wonwoo immediately remembers the restroom rendezvous, convinces himself for at least five minutes that Mingyu knows nothing, and tries not to heed the neighboring attention.</p><p>“How was it?”</p><p>Mingyu is the one asking. Wonwoo has an awful inkling that he’s the one being addressed.</p><p>“Jihoon didn’t have much to say after reviewing the footage,” he answers. “That should tell you enough.”</p><p>“But what about you?”</p><p>“What about me?”</p><p>Mingyu’s eyes squeeze when his head is doused in a salt spray. His hair is looser than the clean slick or straightness it’s usually found in, as if it hasn't seen a brush in months. He’d actually changed outfits moments prior—some high-fashion avant-garde thing, as if if a suit had melted on a body in such a way that Minghao only finds acceptable with the top button or two undone.</p><p>Jun whistles lowly. Wonwoo elbows him, turns his head in an apology for someone he doesn’t have responsibility over. But then the open stare Mingyu gives him stops the apology.</p><p>“I guess what I mean is: What did <em>you</em> think of it?”</p><p>Mingyu’s voice hangs slightly at the end, a silent “hyung” there with as much discretion as a billboard. A half-open shirt and self-consciousness are an odd combination.</p><p>“You know, as the writer,” is the follow-up.</p><p>So he wants approval. Praise, even.</p><p><em>Is this just a joke again? Like before? </em>Wonwoo thinks to himself before not caring at all if it is, frankly. Some fun is allowed after whatever entertainment Mingyu had wrenched out of Wonwoo earlier.</p><p>When Minghao turns to pack his Chinese cosmetics with Jun on his tail in surprised Mandarin, Wonwoo steps towards Mingyu. Everyone in periphery is probably too busy cleaning up for the day, more occupied with Friday night happy hours to care about whatever business the head scriptwriter has with one of the leads this time.</p><p>Wonwoo brings the flat of his forefinger to Mingyu’s exposed collarbone. There, a patch of highlighter could be blended out better, so Wonwoo brushes it, with care. Forehead level with Mingyu’s jaw, Wonwoo doesn’t have to look up to feel it tense.</p><p>“It was good.”</p><p>“Oh. Yeah?”</p><p>“Yeah,” says Wonwoo, eyes lifting up when he’s done, “but you can do better.”</p><p>“Fuck <em>off</em> with that,” Jun mutters nearby. He’s snickering next to Minghao silently gagging.</p><p>A small smirk and hard pinch of skin forces a gust out of Mingyu’s nose. Wonwoo rubs at the soreness he must have produced, raises his brows—<em>Is this what you wanted?—</em>before striding off to gather his things, on the floor against the wall, barely four strides away from where Mingyu must be gaping at him. The gaze on Wonwoo’s back feels like sun-baked honey: amber, warm, syrupy.</p><p>“Minghao,” oh, sounds like Chaeyeon is back, “Did you see Joshua’s Instagram story?”</p><p>Without warning, the warm feeling is dropped into ice water.</p><p>“Looks like his dad is feeling better. Thank god, I was worried that—”</p><p>“Joshua? Hong?”</p><p>Wonwoo says it aloud, maybe too loudly, before his brain can convince him otherwise. It’s like bone-deep reflex. The name tastes bittersweet. Embarrassment quickly trickles into Wonwoo’s hands, which can’t seem to zip up his laptop case properly.</p><p>Chaeyeon stares for moment before saying, “Yes, that’s Mingyu’s acting coach. Well, previous acting coach. Do you know him?”</p><p>To Jun’s credit, his face gives away nothing despite the dreadfully familiar name—unlike Wonwoo, whose face must be a cinematic story in and of itself.</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Oh, the irony of finding truth in fiction. Is the overarching metaphor of the AU heavy-handed? Hell yeah, I just love it 😍</p><p>For those interested, I’m posting “behind-the-scenes” tumblr entries with running thoughts I had while writing. Perhaps they'll whet your appetite between chapters.</p><p>Thank you so much for reading! See you in the next one. ;)</p><p> <br/>  <a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com">tumblr</a></p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>Mingyu pipes in quickly.</p><p>“You do know Joshua,” he says for Wonwoo. “We’re in Korea, duh, not like there are many Joshuas to know. Do you hate him? Did he do something wrong to you? I can talk to, well Chae can, to our boss—”</p><p>“No, no, that’s very unnecessary. Please don’t do that.” Wonwoo is rapidly waving a hand, swallowing down whatever bonfire smoke his stomach couldn’t contain. <em>Weak, even still. </em>“I don’t think he’s even capable of being mean. You guys probably know that. It’s just, Joshua and I know—knew each other in uni. I haven’t seen or heard of him in quite a while, so it was a...surprise, hearing that name. Here.”</p><p>There is more in Wonwoo’s words than he intended to say, being so ill-masked in whatever wistful tones he can’t strangle back to indifference.</p><p>In fact, what Chaeyeon said before—<em>his father is feeling better—</em>suddenly hits Wonwoo like a ripped rubber band.</p><p>“What,” he says, unable to help it, “What happened to his father?”</p><p>Chaeyeon flinches. “Oh, that. It’s...not my place to say. I shouldn’t have said what I said. I’m sorry.”</p><p>The lapse in her composure is a comfort, strangely, in the same way she sometimes swears up the wall despite that fresh fruit of a face she has. Wonwoo understands. Appearances are everything here, so breaks in them are welcome in his eyes.</p><p>He sets a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t apologize. I understand. And you’ve had a very long day, you know, so you should finish your schedules today and get some rest. Longer days are ahead of all of us.”</p><p>Chaeyeon sighs, looks up to Wonwoo in thanks before motioning for her crew to head to the parking lot. Wonwoo doubts she’ll listen to him about resting, but pot and kettle, he supposes.</p><p>When a makeup intern starts a creams versus powders debate, Minghao immediately latches on with <em>very </em>vocal opinions, leaving Mingyu behind to linger without much to say. No, he always has something to say, just not to them. In fact, he’s being terribly unsubtle about trying not to turn around.</p><p>Will he be okay? More than that, what about his performance, knowing his acting coaches are connected in some vaguely antagonistic way? Is he conflicted over who to side with? Is he even thinking about taking sides? Wonwoo knows he’s overthinking, assuming that Mingyu even cares at all—</p><p>“Go on, talk to your grasshopper,” teases Jun from behind Wonwoo. “I’ll fix the zipper on your bag.”</p><p>“Is this some secret plan to unfix other zippers?”</p><p>“If you want it to be, more than happy to accommodate.”</p><p>“Of course you are,” says Wonwoo, chuckling despite himself. “Be right back. Let’s get dinner later. I’ll pay.”</p><p>Wonwoo makes quick work of the distance between him and Mingyu, who, just by existing, has already lured in several compliments from the staff. Of course Mingyu would reflect each kindness with great speed and even greater magnitude, which is actually more impressive with how visible the heart-shaped arrows are when they’re shot.</p><p>Mingyu finishes off autographing a napkin when Wonwoo says, “If you don’t want the grief of rejecting the catering noonas’ spoils, being a little colder is advisable.”</p><p>“Ah, you surprised me, hyu—I mean...”</p><p>“You can say it. I wasn’t that serious about it earlier.”</p><p>“That’s not very convincing<em>,</em>” contends Mingyu, lips stretching to a dangerous curve, “considering how absolutely, very serious you are all the time. I can’t not take you seriously. You even have this amazing pokerface during meal times, <em>hyung.”</em></p><p>Wonwoo almost follows the impulse of punching Mingyu’s dumb, couture-clad shoulder.</p><p>Instead, he sneers, quietly so only Mingyu hears. “If only people knew just how cheeky you are when you speak to your elders. Your job is on thin ice with me, buddy.”</p><p>“Me? Cheeky? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Those couture shoulders of his raise. “I’m an <em>angel</em>. At least, that’s the nickname people’ve been giving me these days.”</p><p>Wonwoo barks a disbelieving <em>ha</em>. “What were the nicknames before that? Brat? Punk?”</p><p>“Prince Charming. Handsome Guy. Pretty sure Angel was making rounds even before.”</p><p>Disney employees aside, anyone else would physically recoil saying all that. And yet Mingyu says it so shamelessly in a way that suggests just how used to it he is. Is this what lonely tweens are into now? Shamelessness?</p><p>“Why am I even talking to you off hours?” gripes Wonwoo, mouth twitching. “I was supposed to say something to you, but all that cringe wiped me out. Probably something about memorizing lines, because I have to tell you to do that. Anyway, I’ll text Chaeyeon when I inevitably remember what I really had to say at three in the morning—”</p><p>Just as Wonwoo is about to leave, pressure tugs at his shirt sleeve. Turns out the midway point of facing that pressure versus running away is staying stock still.</p><p>Eventually, Mingyu says, “I’m going to work hard. You don’t have to worry about that. So let’s work hard together, yeah?”</p><p>Pins and needles have sprouted in Wonwoo’s feet.</p><p>A slow, awful moment passes before Wonwoo considers the thought that, perhaps, Mingyu knew from the start exactly what Wonwoo’s objective was for this conversation: to see if Mingyu still cares.</p><p>And, like the many compliments from before, the same question is now cleverly reflected back at Wonwoo.</p><p>“Hyung?”</p><p>It was a mistake, giving that word back to him.</p><p>“Yes,” says Wonwoo, not turning around, “Let’s work hard, then.”</p><p>In the distance, Minghao’s irritated calls for Mingyu to <em>get the hell over here, the car’s been waiting for ages </em>grow frighteningly closer at a speed that cues Wonwoo to fast-walk out of there unless he wants to witness a murder. Mingyu sounds strangled soon after, but he still manages a “Bye, hyung! Coach! Hyung-coach!” before he is dragged away.</p><p>An uncreative moniker, really, but reassuring. In a way.</p><p>That night, Twitter trends its complaints of Mingyu’s lateness to the fansign. In the high-brow Thai place Jun has forced Wonwoo into, a girl at a nearby table laughs to her friend and says:</p><p>“Honestly, if I were his fan, I’d be really annoyed, too! But at least he’s cute, you know?”</p><p>If Wonwoo wasn’t glaring so hard at the bill, he’d probably be hard pressed to disagree.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Drowning in work is like massaging an old muscle cramp—a temporary fix to a more chronic issue.</p><p>With actors on a short break from training before filming starts, it’s crunch time for the writing team. Wonwoo would rather literally break a leg than admit it, but his working days do feel quieter with editing the script now full-time again. Days consist of hours-long meetings, watching each round of test footage and adjusting unnatural dialogue as they come.</p><p>Jeonghan is smothering with his insubstantial input up until it becomes actually substantial, at which point it’s a little dizzying how fencer-like his wit for gripping narratives can be. Wonwoo often wonders if Jeonghan does this just to tease him about the value of formal education in writing.</p><p>“Bored with your own story now?” Jeonghan’s grin is positively Cheshire. “Or bored with the job? Either way, I find both quite exciting, still.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s fingers jolt above his laptop keyboard. “What gives you the impression that I’m bored?”</p><p>“The grapevine tells me—and by grapevine, I really mean the set assistants—that you’re rather well-adjusted to,” Jeonghan taps his chin, “other departments.”</p><p>Most of everyone else is civil enough to not fuel the bonfire. But the slam of Wonwoo’s finger on the DELETE button does incite a giggle or two.</p><p>Gossip runs like water and there’s always someone who can make wine out of it, so Wonwoo locks down on whatever windows might be accidentally open to himself. And to others.</p><p>But any time Wonwoo tries to practice any degree of aloofness, the same damn person finds a way to brute-force his way in.</p><p>At least the methodology is...marginally more elegant this time.</p><p>“Is this,” says Hansol, one of the younger, more interesting writers, “Is this all for us?”</p><p>Others echo a similar question, mostly in awe of having nothing else to say. Thank goodness for Jeonghan’s other obligations today, lest Wonwoo never hear the end of it.</p><p>Sitting on their conference table is a grossly abundant set of gift baskets, full of what looks to be designer pastries and baked goods. Scones the size of hands. Danishes and tarts of every color. There are even dispensers of fresh coffee, creamers and milks on a table nearby, which, based on the primal moans, is very much appreciated by the extra-depleted this morning.</p><p>Before anyone gets the chance, Wonwoo snatches the white, silver trim card atop one of the gift baskets.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>Dear Writing Team,</em>
  </p>
  <p>
<em>Thank you very much for being the amazing backbone to this entire production! With the producer’s permission and some chipping in from the other actors, we wanted to show our gratitude with a small gift that will hopefully energize you through the last revisions. We look forward to all your hard work! Fighting!</em>
</p>
  <p>
  <em>Sincerely,</em>
</p>
  <p>
  <em>Kim Mingyu</em></p>
</blockquote><p>“Does it say who it’s from?”</p><p>Wonwoo startles at Hansol’s voice. He’d just assumed everyone flocked to the coffee.</p><p>“Mingyu,” Wonwoo says, however begrudging. There’s no point denying something that will be known eventually, especially since Jeonghan does indeed know. “The cast all contributed to this, it seems, but I’m guessing he organized this, given that his name is the only one explicitly identified.”</p><p>“You make it sound so clinical. Is that on purpose?”</p><p>“This is how I talk, Mister Chwe.”</p><p>“And you talk like that on purpose.”</p><p>The sentence is stated rather than asked, and rather amused at that. Wonwoo mouth sets like marble. Being surprised on purpose at work is one thing, but being spoken to this frankly by someone younger—who is also technically a sunbae—doesn’t improve Wonwoo’s souring mood. The distant coffee smell helps.</p><p>“Whatever this is,” Hansol continues, yawning, “It’s not like he can bribe us to write him more lines with how many he already has.”</p><p>“Is that…common?”</p><p>With a bite of fruit tart, Hansol chuckles. “Screentime is like real estate, and real estate can get real expensive this side of town. People who can pay for it usually do.”</p><p>“Mingyu isn’t the type—” is as much as Wonwoo gets out by the time Hansol has flounced to the fancy marbled bread.</p><p>Wonwoo’s teeth grind, and then release.</p><p>He forces down a sigh, keeps himself tight-lipped when he picks at a plain croissant and sips his coffee. The other writers chatter on about how much they love Kim Mingyu, would love to work with him in the future, are wondering if he’s sleeping with a Pledis board member to be here—</p><p>Wonwoo nearly spits his drink.</p><p>Many things in life annoy him. And the list grows longer every day. Few such things are so lucky as to genuinely piss off Wonwoo, but it’s lottery day today and some whiny fucker is winning a prize.</p><p>Wonwoo’s eyes find exactly who’d said that last bit. The resulting flinch shows poor conviction, which irritates him even more.</p><p>“Call me ignorant from coming from a mainly indie film background,” says Wonwoo, prim but edged with ice, “But if this is what it takes to make a mainstream movie—speaking carelessly behind others’ backs, especially those whose careers would be destroyed if they did just a fraction of the same thing—then I find it quite telling of the people who choose to stay in this industry, let alone enjoy what they do.”</p><p>For all the writing these people have done, no one utters a word. Only a small smile from Hansol can be seen in the periphery.</p><p>“But,” Wonwoo adds, “I’m sure most of you are quite levelheaded, professional, and good at what you do. You wouldn’t be here otherwise, right? Now let’s finish the scenes today as soon as possible. Our cast needs them for practice.”</p><p>That writer rightfully keeps their mouth shut, and the rest of the revisions finish quite smoothly. So much so that Wonwoo even treats himself to some fancy marbled bread.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“And you didn’t save me any?” complains Soonyoung.</p><p>Through a mouthful of the last slice brought home, Wonwoo says, “It wasn’t for you.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b><br/>
<em>Are you free this weekend? It’s about Mingyu. Call me when you’re free.</em>
</p><p>Wonwoo stops brushing his teeth. It’s right before bedtime when he sees the notification on his phone, doing a double-take at the question posed. As scarce as Chaeyeon’s breaks in composure are, even scarcer is the conscious decision to bother Wonwoo for when he’s not scheduled to work. More worrying is the fact that Mingyu is involved.</p><p>He dials her number.</p><p>“You texted? Is Mingyu okay? Are you all okay? Ah, sorry, I didn’t mean to call without a text.”</p><p>“Don’t worry about it,” says Chaeyeon, chuckling, “And yes, yes, he’s fine, it’s nothing life-threatening. He’s just being a big baby about the script.”</p><p>“Oh. You made it sound serious.”</p><p>“Depends on what you think is serious.”</p><p>“Elaborate, please.”</p><p>“Mingyu doesn’t seem,” says Chaeyeon, slowly, “<em>comfortable</em> with scene twelve.”</p><p>Wonwoo quirks a brow. “Is it the relationship or…?”</p><p>Chaeyeon laugh-exhales through the static. “No, of course not. We knew what we were getting into. But whenever he tries to practice with me—<em>at</em> me, rather—he gets into this weird fit, tells me he ‘can’t get into the mindset’ or whatever and then turns super frustrated. You have a better handle on him than I do when it comes to this acting stuff.”</p><p><em>You have a better handle on him. </em>Her words repeat in Wonwoo’s mind. She wants Wonwoo to come over and coach, is what she’s really asking for.</p><p>“We could pay you for the overtime,” she says.</p><p>“Miss Jung.”</p><p>“And meals will be provided for—”</p><p>“Miss Jung Chaeyeon,” Wonwoo presses and, noticing the silent acknowledgement, says, “Is it really just for work?”</p><p>Not a sound is made for a while, before: “Not entirely, no.”</p><p>Wonwoo expected as much, even daring to think that Chaeyeon has her own personal motivations. He’s wrong, of course, but the thought is considered anyway.</p><p>“Mingyu’s still relatively new to all this fame,” she says, sounding less practiced than before. “Our company was pretty small and poorly managed before a new one bought us, when only Mingyu was left. We didn’t have any proper seniors then, so he doesn’t have anyone to rely on professionally, especially in film and television. Even though we’ve met some amazing people in recent years, it’s still a recent change. I’ve been Mingyu’s manager and friend for a long time. But I’m not as trusting as he is.”</p><p>“He does trust too easily.”</p><p>“I keep scolding him for it and he never listens.” Chaeyeon sighs long-sufferingly, still somehow fond. “But you’re different. I know we’ve worked with you before in the past, even if less directly than this. I admire your work ethic and professionalism. Your goals are genuine. I have a sense that you’re fully aware of what industry you’re in, too, if that makes sense.”</p><p>“That does, unfortunately.”</p><p>“And, since I don’t think my opinion of you is very much convincing, Mingyu tells me he thinks rather well of you. We could use more people like you in his career.”</p><p>Wonwoo nearly drops the phone, but he semi-saves that disaster by dropping his toothbrush instead. The clattering is loud and resonates in his small bathroom, enough to make Chaeyeon almost ask what had happened if not for Wonwoo quickly interjecting.</p><p>“I suspect he isn’t taking me seriously enough,” he says, “if he thinks rather well of me.”</p><p>“Trust me. He takes you very seriously.”</p><p>“The other day, I’m pretty sure he told me something of the—“ opposite? Of the like? Memories of equal support and contradiction flit through Wonwoo’s mind. “In any case, I will say that your opinion <em>is</em> important, Miss Jung. Your work ethic and your own handle of people are admirable.”</p><p>“Oh, honey, I know that,” she says, laughing, “But I am still trying to persuade you.”</p><p>Wonwoo doesn’t foresee this conversation going where he wants.</p><p>“Fine, you’ve succeeded. Text me the time and place,” he assents, pinching the skin between his eyes. “And the catering better make me shit gold afterwards from being so expensive, Miss Jung.”</p><p>Chaeyeon makes a victorious sound. Wonwoo can clearly imagine her smile when she says, “We’ll put extra truffle shavings in your McDonalds. And since we’re on swearing terms now, call me Chaeyeon. Or Chae, if you can’t be bothered with two syllables.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">What, what do you mean? I mean, that’s, <em>what?</em></p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I feel like you’re asking that just to hear me repeat myself.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">And what if I am?</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE can’t help but smile at JAESANG’s whining.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I think I’ve grown to like you, JAESANG. But—</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">But? <em>But?!</em> There wasn’t a “but” the first time you said it!</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Would you let me talk?! Like I said, I have grown to like you, JAESANG. Really. You’re so, so sweet and playful and earnest. But I’m still your sunbae–</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">You’re my hyung.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue"><em>And</em> the assistant coach.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I don’t understand.</p>
  <p>CHUNGHEE takes a sip of his beer, exhales, before looking JAESANG more squarely in the eye.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I’m the older one. Not only that, I’m a figure of authority to you. I’ve said what I said, yes, but what comes after is more complicated than you make it out to be.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Yeah you’re older, yeah you’re everything else we listed off. But why does that even matter? We’re just us, just JAESANG and CHUNGHEE off the court, aren’t we?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">You know it doesn’t work like that. You can’t just separate things how you want and expect people to follow.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Then! Then why tell me in the first place? Surely, you know how I feel. I didn’t even get a chance to tell you—</p>
  <p>JAESANG is interrupted by CHUNGHEE clearing his throat. Camera cuts to JAESANG’s glassy eyes before back to CHUNGHEE.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I told you because I wanted to be honest with you. And you deserve more than that.</p>
</div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Then Jaesang gets even sadder, translates sadness into booze, and nearly drops his handsome face into the barbecue grill. Chunghee drags him back to the dorms, but not before Jaesang drunkenly insists on a kiss under a mossy streetlamp, arguing that Chunghee owes him that much for the heartbreak.</p><p>Chunghee obliges, thinking Jaesang won’t remember the morning after. Jaesang does.</p><p>That’s how the scene is finishes. Granted, it’s mostly there to make the payoff of the openly cute shenanigans later worth the wait. Coming into this practice, Wonwoo had even fully prepared himself for soap opera dramatics, or at least to help Mingyu practice using eye drops if Wonwoo fails to make him cry—which isn’t supposed to be an issue if Mingyu bothered getting into the damn headspace.</p><p>“The other scenes played out just fine,” chides Wonwoo, arms crossed tight and weight on one leg in his stance. He really can’t wrap his head around this. “The flirting was fine, the elbow-touching was fine. Hell, even the falling over on top of me was fine—”</p><p>“For the record, that last one was not fine. I almost hurt you.”</p><p>“I’m not glass, I’m not going to break. And you’ve already fallen on top of me once, what’s one more time?” Wonwoo says, newly irritated. “What’s wrong with this scene in particular? It’s not like—don’t look at me like that, I can’t read your mind. I can’t help you unless you help me help you. Contrary to what I’ve said before, words <em>can</em> be useful, if you use them properly.”</p><p>Mingyu smacks his hands onto his face and groans; none of it is intelligible. Wonwoo hopes Mingyu didn’t unintentionally give himself two black eyes with how hard that double smack sounded.</p><p>Maybe using the company’s dance studio with its wall mirror was a bad idea. Maybe Mingyu has gotten too self-conscious in seeing his reflection, which he is wont to become when his acting quality deescalates and he is fully aware of it. Wonwoo knows that feeling and it’s awful to get out of.</p><p>“Mingyu? Please, say something.”</p><p>When Mingyu refuses to respond, Wonwoo gives up and, before he can think better of it, reaches out.</p><p>Halfway into the space between them, his hand pauses, fingers curling back from the many second thoughts of crossing borders not meant to be crossed. Perhaps foolishly, with hope, Wonwoo continues onwards.</p><p>His fingers settle gently on Mingyu’s wrist. Mingyu flinches.</p><p>“You can be honest with me,” says Wonwoo. He’s quiet, even with the privacy. The nails of his other hand dig into his palm to level his voice. “If it’s any help, I’m under contractual obligation to keep my mouth shut, anyway.”</p><p>“Hasn’t stopped people from opening their mouths before.”</p><p>“I can’t argue with that.”</p><p>The hand under Wonwoo’s grip slips down, inch by inch, until half of Mingyu’s exceptionally, phenomenally scarlet complexion is revealed. Even Wonwoo can’t help but pause with the stark difference in color between Mingyu’s cheeks and knuckles.</p><p>“Remember when,” mumbles Mingyu, looking very much elsewhere now, “Remember when I told you I felt seen? With this script?”</p><p>“Yes. I remember.”</p><p>“There’s this—god, Chae’s gonna kill me for telling you—there was this sunbae.” Mingyu is now squeezing his eyes shut. “There was this sunbae on the set of a movie I was a part of, a long time ago. My group was about to break up when filming started, and I barely had any acting training. It was a small, small role in a small, small movie—don’t look at me like that, I’m <em>not</em> going to mention what it was. My acting was way too embarrassing. Anyway, the exposure was almost nothing, but I…I really liked this sunbae. Watching them really changed me. Pushed me to act more.”</p><p>The watercolor of Mingyu’s face is so saturated that it fills Wonwoo’s chest with identical feeling. This, also, he knows well.</p><p>And Wonwoo says as much: “I know what you mean. Really, I do.”</p><p>“You do?”</p><p>“Yeah,” says Wonwoo, more softly than intended. “Yeah.”</p><p>Low rumbling from the nearby fan sounds louder in the silence. The ceiling lights are bleach-white and almost painful to be under too long. Wonwoo scrambles through his thoughts to find whatever else he could possibly say, to anchor the open ends that have fallen out of his pockets once again.</p><p>Fine. An eye for an eye, then. “I did tell you that this story was based off of my life, right?” he says.</p><p>“You did,” says Mingyu until the realization visibly hits him, “Wait, so it…wasn’t in sports?”</p><p>“That’s what you took from what I said before?” Wonwoo blinks, incredulous. “I just liked watching it in uni sometimes. Do I seem like someone who played competitive sports?”</p><p>“Whatever I say will be the wrong answer.”</p><p>“<em>That</em> is correct.”</p><p>Mingyu splutters a little, lets the other hand fall from his face in defeat of the statement. He still isn’t looking Wonwoo in the eye, but at least Wonwoo can see those canines sticking out despite the flush stubbornly clinging to Mingyu’s skin.</p><p>“I had a sunbae, too, in university,” says Wonwoo. “I watched them in a movie long before then. I watched every possible thing they showed up in. I thought they were what acting was supposed to be. And I, as luck would have it, ended up being in a college class they were assisting in. The fool that I was thought it was destiny.”</p><p>Mingyu’s face softens. It’s unbearable. He looks at Wonwoo with an expression a camera would be desperate for but doesn’t deserve.</p><p>“You weren’t foolish. Fondness and hope aren’t foolish.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s fingers falter. He is astounded at how perfectly ignorant yet remarkably virtuous Mingyu sounds; the line sounds like it’s from some dramatic historical or fantasy story, and yet it just came right out if him.</p><p>“My point is that the clothing may be different, but the body is still the same,” Wonwoo says, at last, cotton-mouthed. “So now I understand why this scene might be weird for you to do. I guess I can talk to Jeonghan about some last-minute changes—”</p><p>“No! No, that’s okay, I’m,” Mingyu clears his throat, adjusts his stance like he doesn’t know where his feet should go, “I can get through the scene. Saying everything I said all out loud just felt really stupid to be honest, but I feel a little less stupid now? Some weight off my shoulders or whatever people say?”</p><p>“You weren’t being stupid. You were being honest, which is what I asked for.”</p><p>In response, a traitorous part of Wonwoo makes him squeeze Mingyu’s wrist, which he still hasn’t let go of.</p><p>“Thank you,” Wonwoo says, “For being honest. With me.”</p><p>Mingyu splutters some more but at least it sounds like his feet have found the floor again, given the quick escape of his wrist—“I’m hungry, I’ll call Chae about lunch”—so he can do exactly that. Wonwoo knows Mingyu bounces back well after food. It’s like a good night’s sleep in the daytime. He’ll be fine.</p><p>Now left to his own devices with Mingyu outside the room, Wonwoo lets his gaze wander across the chicken scratch on his notepad.</p><p>
  <em>Act more outraged and confused. Needs intensity. Get into CH’s face with desperation for his attention and affection.</em>
</p><p>That’s who Wonwoo imagined Jaesang would be or at least how the naïveté would manifest. But it will probably save some anguish to accept that that’s not who Mingyu is, nor who he’s going to be, and that’s okay. This wouldn’t be the first time Wonwoo has compromised artistic vision for realism. A sweeter romance is just as exciting as a dramatic one, he supposes.</p><p>On the other hand, Wonwoo can’t help his immense curiosity of what Mingyu had said. What story—which <em>person</em>—could reduce a top star into complete disarray like that?</p><p>Then again, it’s not like Wonwoo hasn’t seen Mingyu in some form of disarray before. Must be the nosy writer brain again.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“You said you don’t drink much, so maybe we should we should practice that part of the scene.”</p><p>“Hyung says that like I’m experienced in any part of the scene at all.”</p><p>“So did you want to practice the kissing part, too?”</p><p>“Wha—I didn’t say that!”</p><p>“I can see why you’re popular in variety. You’ve got great reactions.”</p><p><em>“Hyuuung </em>my heart can’t take this—<em>”</em></p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b><br/>
<em>I have no idea what black magic you’re using, but it’s working. Even Mingyu’s variety show appearances have been better these days. If you’re ever craving some free drinks with a drinking pal, let me know.</em>
</p><p>
  <b>From: CEO Yoon Jeonghan</b><br/>
<em>Received the edits~!!! Definitely fits the newbie a lot more now, but I bet you already knew that. ;)</em>
</p><p>
  <b>From: Director Lee Jihoon</b><br/>
<em>Just finished the last set of test shots. He’s gotten better. Good work.</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Filming officially starts without issue.</p><p>Grandiose sets are constructed with expert touch and an eye for modern interior design, supplemented by a schedule of handpicked locations where privacy feels too abundant to not have been paid for. Carefully curated outfits hang neatly on a rack in one corner, wide screens and computers sit ready for use in another. Even personalized folding chairs are delivered to the set, much to Wonwoo’s surprise and inclusion. Hopefully those can be taken home when this madness is all over.</p><p>“You better share it when you do,” Jun whines, very salty at the fact he didn’t get his own fancy chair despite knowing full well his role still isn’t big enough for one. “It looks so comfortable.”</p><p>“It’s just for show. It really isn’t that comfortable.”</p><p>“Wow, so the big shot thinks he’s big enough to start complaining already, huh? Fame has changed you.”</p><p>“Literally nothing has been filmed yet.”</p><p><em>“Changed </em>you<em>,</em> I say!”</p><p>It’s at this moment Mingyu glances in their direction. Inside this gymnasium set, he’s a fair distance away in his stylishly disheveled look, mismatched training clothes, and that singular, characteristic kneepad. The tiny noonas around him make him look vastly taller and unrealistic by comparison.</p><p>Harder to ignore are the offhand compliments Wonwoo often hears from them about Mingyu. Wonwoo doesn’t translate the praise for himself since tutelage isn’t without the effort thereafter, but he <em>does</em> feel a strong satisfaction in seeing Mingyu do so well. <em>It’s the character growth</em>, one could say. Perhaps unironically so.</p><p>Whatever it is, Wonwoo tries to not be so viscerally aware of it. Mixed results thus far.</p><p>“Talk of the Town is looking our way,” observes Jun.</p><p>“Or spacing out with his face coincidentally angled this way,” contends Wonwoo.</p><p>“That’s a very specific direction.”</p><p>“Every direction is specific.”</p><p>Jun does a little wave Mingyu eventually mirrors with such visible hesitation that, <em>oh god, </em>Wonwoo remembers the horrible shit show that was the handjob Jun thought so practical to give in their mutual workplace. Mingyu nearly walked in on that. He even talked to Wonwoo with the stall wall between them. Wonwoo can’t bear to think of the chance that Mingyu knows exactly what had happened and is just too polite (or too wracked with nausea) to ever mention it.</p><p>Surely he can’t know, not when he can still look Wonwoo in the eyes like this. <em>Okay, maybe the ‘spacing out’ excuse was stupid. </em>Wonwoo doesn’t know what to do with himself now.</p><p>God, Mingyu is dressed like a dream—literally, Wonwoo has dreamt of this very moment, words on paper now brought to life in the soon-to-be filmed scene of that first, clumsy meeting at the university gym.</p><p>Mingyu lips pinch. One hand is gripping the wrist of the other like a nervous tick in such a way that Wonwoo feels oddly compelled to reach out again, even from where he’s standing what feels like miles away.</p><p>“Everyone starting in the first scene gather!” Jihoon yells. “We’re shooting take one in five minutes!”</p><p>Wonwoo doesn’t do any of that, of course.</p><p>Excitement is thick and palpable in the air. The chatter in the room feels like the inside of a champagne bottle with how dizzying the buzz feels; that must be why Wonwoo is still looking in whatever direction is now void of who used to be there. He blinks, quickly returns to himself. Jun is no longer beside him, either.</p><p>All alone now, arguably for the first time in ages, Wonwoo feels something bitter rise in the column of his throat.</p><p>Where the <em>fuck </em>has his professionalism gone? Has he gone <em>soft? </em>He flushes at the questions thrown at himself, even mentally laments this new pattern of lapses in his self-control. This is so unlike him. Wonwoo was better than this at some point.</p><p>And sure, he can grant himself an iota of leeway given the milestone occasion. But clearly too much has made him so careless as to stare blankly across a room when a scene from his <em>own damn script</em> is in the middle of being recorded by a baker’s dozen cameras the price of school tuition—<em>each</em>, probably.</p><p>Wonwoo slaps his face with both hands and tries his best to ignore the stares (and perhaps the cinematic parallels to an image he has seen before).</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">HYEON JAESANG, correct?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Y-Yes, that’s me.</p>
  <p>JAESANG can barely look CHUNGHEE in the eye as they help the others clean up after practice.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Your spikes are insanely accurate. I could never get it to hit the corners with that kind of precision. What’s your secret?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I have really flexible wrists. Got it from my dad. Helped him a ton during his badminton days.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Ah, sports family?</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">My sister would laugh at you if you said that in front of her.</p>
  <p>Both of them laugh. CHUNGHEE starts to unfasten the net from the standing poles as JAESANG holds the ladder still.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I know it’s just the first day, but I hope you don’t make lateness a habit, JAESANG.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">Will you kick me out if I do?</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I’ll make you wish you were kicked out.</p>
  <p>JAESANG jostles the ladder in retaliation, making CHUNGHEE yelp and pretend to whack him on the head.</p>
</div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“<em>Ow</em>, what the hell was that for?!”</p><p>“You kept staring at me and it was ticking me off,” Wonwoo says, deadpan. “You know that makes me uncomfortable.”</p><p>“Yeah, well, you don’t have to treat me like a punching bag,” grumbles Soonyoung as he picks through his Chinese takeout; they only get the chance to eat it when Jun’s not around. “I puke on your designer pants <em>one</em> time—”</p><p>“And I was saving up for them for <em>so damn long</em>—”</p><p>“You know full well that you’re my default bucket when I get drunk! So, I would argue that it’s really <em>your</em> fault that you got puke on those stupid pants.”</p><p>Soonyoung punctuates his blasphemy with a sip of his orange soda. Wonwoo punches his arm again because if Soonyoung didn’t deserve it the first time, he definitely deserves it the second time.</p><p>“Just tell me what’s wrong with my face and be done with it,” says Wonwoo above the background noise of <em>Miracles by the Sea</em>. It was probably one of the worst performing films financially in his repertoire, but he has a soft spot for how sincere the awful budget made the acting look.</p><p>Soonyoung’s face scrunches. “I don’t know what’s been up with you, man. Jun was complaining about finding a new fuck buddy since you broke things off with him after being all pissy at work—”</p><p>“Wow, what a degenerate I must be for wanting to not get fired for being horny. And it’s not like we’ve <em>seriously</em> stopped, just at work.”</p><p>“First of all, gotta live a little, man. Life’s too short to not get that work wank, y’know? And second,” says Soonyoung above some generically emotional dialogue between fake lovers on a beach, “It feels hypocritical or at least sorta uncool of you to do that while canoodling with someone else and not telling us about it.”</p><p>Wonwoo almost chokes on the garlic green bean in his mouth. “The fuck? Ca<em>noodling</em>? Where’d you even get that idea from?”</p><p>“Because you’re not with Jun all the damn time anymore? And you just look so...off these days. But, like, in a not shitty way? Which clearly means it’s something good enough to hit your emotionally distant but still available heart.”</p><p>Soonyoung makes intense, V-sign laser eyes at Wonwoo, which Wonwoo swats away.</p><p>“Don’t lie to me. I know. You’re my best bud, I’m your best bud. I have a <em>radar</em> for these things. It’s like having a gaydar—queerdar? I don’t know, you’re not dick exclusive—but that whatever-dar is specifically for you. You get what I’m saying?”</p><p>“…There are a lot of things you’ve said that I need to process.”</p><p>“You aren’t denying any of it though!”</p><p>Wonwoo exhales deeply while pinching the skin between his eyes. Suddenly, his craving for General Tso’s chicken has significantly waned, which says a lot because that’s his comfort place food. “What happened to our movie nights? Have we really devolved this much? Why do I keep letting you into my home, knowing this is what you do to my blood pressure?”</p><p>There is an expected stretch of time, so much so that Wonwoo almost starts eating again. Of course, he does not.</p><p>Soonyoung raises a dramatic hand to his dramatic forehead and cries out, “You’re not breaking up with me, too, are you? Is this person really that hot? Have you fallen for another actor desperate to make it in the world but hasn’t yet? Are they so charming that you’d throw away your bestest bud for a super hot stud—oh hey, that rhymed—”</p><p>“I am <em>this</em> close to stepping on your balls, Kwon Soonyoung.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s forefinger and thumb are pressed tightly together, after which Soonyoung has a split second to miss the meteoric force of Wonwoo’s foot on the couch cushion. Damn dancer’s agility. Soonyoung cackles himself teary-eyed as Wonwoo tries not to crack a smile but does so anyway.</p><p>“Nothing is going on,” Wonwoo huffs as he drops back onto the couch. He offers a hand to Soonyoung, who takes it and crawls into the space beside him. “I guess I’m just…happy that this is all really happening. Editing. Writing. Anticipation for the end product, for lack of a better way of putting it.”</p><p>“Oh. That’s it?”</p><p>“What do you mean ‘Oh, that’s it?’”</p><p>“Well, work is almost always a sore spot for you, so it’s kind of weird to hear you say that. I always have to fight whatever it is out of you and it’s usually something crazy, or serious, or crazy serious.”</p><p>On the screen, actor Wonwoo is making a promise to his female co-lead to keep her secret if she keeps his. They even share a pinky promise about the ordeal. It’s his favorite scene in the movie for how plain yet foundational that connection is. This, essentially, is the whole story dragged out for two hours.</p><p>With effort, Wonwoo will admit, “I’ll try to be better about that. I didn’t mean to worry you, if I did. If I am.”</p><p>When Soonyoung makes a show of shoving his head onto Wonwoo’s shoulder, Wonwoo doesn’t comment. As much as they’ve made a ritual of movie nights, it’s been a while since he and Soonyoung have had a moment like this.</p><p>“So,” says Soonyoung. “Is the cast as hot as Jun says it is?”</p><p>“Even better: they’re hot <em>and</em> nice.”</p><p>“How is that even possible?!”</p><p>Wonwoo is helpless to the chuckle that follows. Maybe there really is something off about him.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>The days end rather anticlimactically, though Wonwoo supposes it’s best to be no less exciting than another day at work. Things are going smoothly. Which is good. Which is great.</p><p>“I’ve gotten so many banging power naps from not having to touch up his makeup and hair as often,” says Minghao, watching from the sides as Mingyu stumbles over some dialogue that makes Seungcheol laugh. Jihoon is nodding in approval. “You’ve squeezed a miracle out of that guy. I hope it stays like this.”</p><p>“Me, too,” echoes Wonwoo, watching and nodding, too.</p><p>And so the days continue to end rather anticlimactically, which is simultaneously good and great—up until, one of those days, Jeonghan of course has a say in it otherwise.</p><p>“Well, look who decided to show his handsome-ass face today. And so soon! Didn’t you say you had stuff to do in America?”</p><p>A familiar, gut-stirring chuckle rings in the dry air of the set. It’s as soft as Wonwoo remembers, save for the slight coarseness of aged texture beneath.</p><p>“I do, I do still. But I was really missing Korea, so I decided to come back for a bit.”</p><p>The person who says this is exactly the person Wonwoo hasn’t wanted to see in years:</p><p>Joshua Hong, standing tall and bright next to a slightly haphazard Chaeyeon in the entryway. His clothes are as plain and nondescript as the luggage in his hands; he must have arrived straight from the airport.</p><p>“I have to fly off again soon, actually,” continues Joshua, as mild as ever, “But there were just too many familiar faces in this project to stay away from for too long.”</p><p>“Ey, don’t you worry your pretty head,” Jeonghan says, much too loudly for comfort, “In fact, your student has been in pretty good hands.”</p><p>“Ah yes, I’ve heard.” Joshua sounds like he’s smiling to his eyes. Wonwoo forces himself not to confirm. “If I may, I’d love to thank such a kind person myself.”</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>You: “How many feelings are you putting in this?” Me: “…Yes.” In other news, Chaeyeon is the workplace ally for the gays we all wish we had. 😤</p><p>For questions, concerns, or a soundboard/listening ear, you can find me on my <a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com">tumblr</a></p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hiatus who? Here's an on-schedule update to celebrate the fandom's most recent win for patience, thoroughness, and empathy. 😤</p><p>Content warning for some brief rumination over mortality.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>Wonwoo was never superstitious or especially interested in astrology.</p><p>And yet, somehow, it doesn’t feel scientifically inaccurate to think that all the planets and stars must be aligned right now to offer one of the worst intersections of his personal, work, and previous lives he has ever come to fathom.</p><p>He isn’t the director. He isn’t the producer. But he’s still the head scriptwriter, damn it, he should <em>know </em>these things.</p><p>Jun surprising Wonwoo with a near-quickie during work is one thing. This? Not even Chaeyeon had the decency to inform Wonwoo that <em>this</em> was going to happen today given who exactly Joshua is in this equation.</p><p>Fuck, no, it’s not her fault. She knows nothing of the details, or at least Wonwoo hopes she’s ignorant. His temples are already throbbing.</p><p>Joshua has enough courtesy to grant Wonwoo some minutes to prepare, having been swept into conversation with Jeonghan, Seungcheol and even Jihoon, all of whom Wonwoo is bewildered to learn are clearly quite friendly with Wonwoo’s old friend. He supposes that’s who Joshua is. Recent development or not, it goes to show just how little Wonwoo really knew of that “old friend”, or at least how vast every little thing shared seemed to feel.</p><p>Wonwoo lets his shoulders relax when Jun arrives at his side.</p><p>“The luck you’ve been hoarding is actually disgusting,” he says in an attempt at lightness, “Wanna buy some lotto tickets after this? Become bajillionaires and move to Fiji? I’ll even drag Soonyoung along.”</p><p>“Had me convinced till you mentioned the gremlin squirrel.”</p><p>“You know you love him.”</p><p>Wonwoo will not give Jun or their absent “gremlin squirrel” the pleasure of being right. But he will let Jun straighten his collar, his hair, to say sweet things about being able to handle this with the same ridiculous professionalism coursing through every fiber in Wonwoo’s body since the day they met.</p><p>“Maybe without the flirty undertones though, so you aren’t hauling too many asses around,” is added despite arm thwack it earns. “What, I’m just being honest! Don’t even try to tell me <em>all</em> the shit you pull on New Suzy is ‘for his own good.’”</p><p>Across the room, Joshua is chatting amiably with Mingyu. The space between them is large enough for the small noonas to move through.</p><p>Wonwoo hisses through his teeth, “Shut up, that doesn’t mean anything,” before steeling himself and walking over.</p><p>At the same time he’s spotted by Mingyu, glitter-lined eyes alight and reflexive “hyung” in his mouth, Joshua’s attention is caught faster. In fact, Joshua strides over—“Jeon Wonwoo, goodness gracious, what a sight it is to see you again!”—before enveloping the head scriptwriter in a big embrace.</p><p>The impact sends pinpricks through Wonwoo’s muscles, ungiving and careful. He returns the warm gesture all the same.</p><p>“Joshua.”</p><p>“How many years has it been?” Joshua throws in a squeeze for good measure. Then he pulls away, hands on Wonwoo’s shoulders with a limpid gaze that really pins Wonwoo down. “You look great! New glasses? The frames look thinner this time. I can see more of your face like this. Ah, first, a congratulations is in order! I’m so happy for you, truly. I’ve always said it was only a matter of time before I saw your name in a big production.”</p><p>“That is,” says Wonwoo, hands retreating to his sides. “That is indeed something you’ve mentioned. Many times.”</p><p>Joshua, bless his heart, smiles that full-bodied smile of his. It’s not the biggest smile in the world, even when the gums come out; damn cute, still. But it is full in the way his eyes nearly close, lines denting the curves of his cheeks. It’s the type of smile big enough to pull the rest of Joshua’s face around it. Sometimes, even, the effects would knock into Wonwoo.</p><p>That power has diminished over time, but Wonwoo can slide him a small grin, if not in interest then out of nostalgia.</p><p>Nearby, Chaeyeon’s eyes widen. “Right, Wonwoo said he knew you, Joshua.”</p><p>“We did,” says Wonwoo as Joshua overlaps with, “We do.”</p><p>A pregnant moment passes. Like smoke in the air, unease grows a bit more suffocating.</p><p>“I probably deserve that,” says Joshua, chuckle swallowed by a yawn. His arms fold with an newfound swell to them that Wonwoo does not acknowledge. “We should have a meal some time soon. I’d love to catch up with you. Only if you’re okay with that, of course. I might’ve tried to rope you into dinner tonight, actually, if I wasn’t so exhausted.”</p><p>“You wear exhaustion well.”</p><p>“A layered statement, and yet none of those layers sounded like a no.”</p><p>They share a courtesy laugh, Joshua more than Wonwoo. Perhaps that’s how it was even before. Wonwoo can’t recall, to be honest.</p><p>“In any case, I hear you’ve been taking great though strict care of Mingyu here. How’s that been?”</p><p>Mingyu startles at the address and the vague target for the question. Wonwoo watches him fiddle with the rings on his fingers, some as thin as thread and others thickset with jewels. They are stacked like too many books across a broadly-spaced shelf, one that could do with less books. Must be another fan sign.</p><p>Evading Joshua’s gaze, Wonwoo meets Mingyu’s halfway instead.</p><p>“His caliber isn’t exceptional thus far,” says Wonwoo. “But he listens. He tries to follow my directions, to the best of his ability. It’s honestly more than I can say for most I’ve worked with.”</p><p>“Tough love as ever, I see.”</p><p>“It will make him...better. At this point, that’s the most important thing.”</p><p><em>Better</em>. The word prompts Mingyu to ghost his fingers over his collarbone, where such display of “tough love” manifested briefly ages ago. There was a patch of highlighter. A top button plucked undone. Some distant part of Wonwoo wonders if he should have pinched the skin hard enough to bruise, just to really emphasize his point.</p><p>“Growth is important, at least in what I’m responsible for,” Wonwoo adds with straightened shoulders. “I just have to make sure he says his lines properly. I don’t have to deal with any of the finances or editing, which can make any acting good if you splice it well enough.”</p><p>Joshua nods gravely. “That’s true, that’s true. Jeonghan’s definitely gathered a good team to do just that, considering the mixed casting.”</p><p>Mingyu has enough mind to start a sentence with vehemence, though unsure of who to direct it to based on the flit of his pupils. But then Minghao, incensed at how long Mingyu has been standing there instead of going to a car that’s apparently been waiting for ages for his preoccupied ass (again), drags him away by the neck—“Grab my arm like a normal person!” “Do you even know how <em>expensive</em> our new dry cleaner is? And why do you keep stalling?!”—to the next event on their itinerary.</p><p>Joshua waves good-bye. Mingyu is too far away to notice.</p><p>“I see you’ve made quite the impression,” quips Joshua.</p><p>Wonwoo shoots him a look. “Don’t bring Mingyu into this. Please. You and I…shit, this was not the reunion I was expecting. I have a lot of things to say, but I don't know how to say any of it right now. I need to think.”</p><p>“If it’s any consolation, this was the last thing I expected when I got the call about my replacement. So to speak,” says Joshua, as temperate as ever in the face of heat. It’s less calming than it used to be. “Granted, that means I had more time to mull over this than you did. How does Saturday sound? Brunch mimosas, if you still like those.”</p><p>For better or for worse, Wonwoo does. Some things never change.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>At times, Wonwoo wonders if he’s grown up at all—if he’s outgrown his bad habits.</p><p>“Should we stop?”</p><p>He hasn’t, really.</p><p>Face sweat-slick and rosy chest rising and falling, Jun looks up at Wonwoo on top of him, a wide-eyed concern that is rare to find in and out of bed. And yet it’s there, <em>here</em>, in easy and delicious reach. This face has broken Wonwoo’s resolve to not return to it more times than he can admit.</p><p>Wonwoo tenses, prepared to start moving again, but Jun’s palms find and grip at Wonwoo’s hips.</p><p>“Hey, hey, this is great and all,” says Jun, a little strained, “But we promised to do it for fun, remember? You don’t look like you’re having fun.”</p><p>“If you’re fishing for compliments—”</p><p>“I’m not. You’re just not good at hiding your expressions in bed.”</p><p>The cool light of Jun’s desk lamp brings a more serious shadow to his normally carefree expression; both of them are as angular as Asian faces go, and yet Jun’s configuration has always looked more approachable. Wonwoo keeps himself from cradling that face. He usually does, out of reflex. People like Jun really make Wonwoo wonder what formula this industry uses to pass up people like him.</p><p>“Truthfully,” says Wonwoo, “I haven’t stopped thinking about that day, when You Know Who showed up on set. I’m meeting him for brunch this weekend. Maybe. I honestly don’t know. I don’t think I’ve told you that yet.”</p><p>“Not that you’re obligated to. Bought out with mimosas again?”</p><p>Wonwoo avoids an answer by forcing movements through the now-loose hold on his hips. The reward is a satisfying crack in Jun’s collectedness, except it doesn’t last long with Jun gathering himself soon after a luscious handful of minutes.</p><p>Wonwoo stills as Jun touches his Adam’s apple, jaw, cheek. The gesture has no business being as gentleas it is—except, there is a distance sometimes, poorly hidden in the stare bound to it. Does Jun ever think of someone else when they do this? If he does, Wonwoo feels more empathy than anything.</p><p><em>For fun</em>. That is the pact they’d made.</p><p>Jun suddenly props himself up, topples Wonwoo over to loom over him at the foot of the full-size mattress. The same, bleach-white desk lamp lends a gleam to Jun’s bared teeth, swathed in that rarely serious, perhaps more sober expression.</p><p>Smiles, an album size of them, flash through Wonwoo’s mind. Some are more recent than others. Jun looks like he senses that.</p><p>Before Wonwoo can justify himself, a mouthy sound slicks up Wonwoo’s throat, next to a jugular that would betray composure if Jun were cruel enough to migrate there. But tonight isn’t about cruelty.</p><p>Jun lifts himself up again, to both look at and look past Wonwoo in this moment.</p><p>“We don’t have to talk about anything if you don’t want to,” says Jun, “But you have to promise that this is the last time we’re fucking like this.” <em>We can’t use each other like distractions all the time. Not for things we need to solve ourselves. </em>“Alright?”</p><p>Wonwoo feels his chest pierce with the sweetness of affection and the venom of shame, being the object and abuser of his dear friend’s goodwill.</p><p>Carefree Jun. Understanding Jun. Loud-mouthed, poorly-filtered, sometimes childish but kind and always charming Jun who only wants what’s best for Wonwoo. For them. As close friends who perfectly understand each other’s positions. It has and never will move beyond that—and Wonwoo is truly grateful for it all.</p><p>Oh, how much easier life would be if Wonwoo could fall in love with Jun instead.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>When Wonwoo said brunch mimosas were for better or for worse, hearing Joshua take a raincheck on them made brunch mimosas decidedly net-worse because, honestly, Wonwoo was really looking forward to dunking his head in a whole pitcher’s worth of that stuff.</p><p>Turns out Mingyu was roped into a last-minute weekend commercial shoot, which necessitated an acting coach to help him look extra refreshed from drinking soda, apparently. Seems like no time was wasted in putting Joshua to work, as short as his time may be in the motherland.</p><p><em>Next time, </em>reads the text. <em>We’ll work something out.</em></p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>They do not, at least not before more film days pass by without a follow-up.</p><p>Wonwoo doesn’t dare ask about rescheduling; he doesn’t want to look desperate. God, it feels like a stupid game of chase all over again, except no one knows (a) who is chasing who and (b) if there is any chasing at all. There shouldn’t be, not any more. At least Joshua has other things to attend to when the new work week rolls around.</p><p>They all temporarily relocate to a local beach front. This is the part of the film where the volleyball team fulfills their semesterly practice of beach volleyball, mainly for some variety in training. Also as a narrative excuse for the main couple to get some privacy.</p><p>And, more importantly, there’s a fucking <em>beach</em>.</p><p>Wonwoo didn’t intend for it to be a fan service thing. Honest. But it turns out that half naked men who are also hot and styled to match a coastline are truly a timeless commodity, so this was really more inevitable than Wonwoo’s own doing. There’s even a staff betting pool over whether the trailer will bother teasing clips.</p><p>“Of course it will!” is one argument. “It’s all about hooking in viewers with eye candy. And we’ve got them by the <em>boatloads</em>.”</p><p>“No no no, it’s going to be a surprise,” contends another, “People are expecting all the sweet and cute then <em>bam!</em> Abs. Pecs. <em>Ass. </em>Can you even imagine the shitstorm Naver’s gonna look like after the first showing? Oh, oh, and <em>Twitter—</em>”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah, I agree. Aren’t there, like, no pics of Kim Mingyu shirtless? You’ve gotta save that for people who actually pay to watch—”</p><p>It’s almost funny, the dead seriousness of these conversations sometimes. If talk about toplessness wasn’t so rampant, they could easily sound like bets about sports. Which is also appropriate.</p><p>From the cool shade of an oversized beach umbrella, Wonwoo grabs a can of lemonade from a cooler and cracks it open. The chill of the aluminum is as refreshing as the citrus hiss, especially given how much his skin is turning into leather at this rate.</p><p>It’s amusing to watch some stylist’s assistant walking around with this comically large bottle of sunscreen oil. Whoever suggested that as an alternative to lotion deserves a raise. Wonwoo wouldn’t be surprised if a fight eventually breaks out over who gets to apply the oil to whom, considering how liberal and frequent application must be.</p><p>Without warning, Jihoon steps into the shade in a sun hat Wonwoo wishes he had.</p><p>“<em>Miracles by the Sea</em> was a pretty shitty film,” says Jihoon, reaching for a can of hard seltzer. “Didn’t realize you were in it until we got here, actually. But you were good. Held up whatever shred of narrative that mess of resource allocation was.”</p><p>Wonwoo isn’t one to admit to being intimidated very easily, but Jihoon has embodied that Young Successful Genius title throughout Wonwoo knowing of and then actually knowing him. An anomaly by so many metrics, yet Lee Jihoon has always been vocal about his opinions: age means nothing; diligence above all else; success is no one else’s definition but your own. Common words from an uncommon person.</p><p>Even now, it’s still boggling to think that Jihoon knows—let alone has <em>watched</em>—part of Wonwoo’s short-lived screen time.</p><p>“Was the director another friend of yours?” Wonwoo asks.</p><p>“A distant cousin, actually. Distant enough for people to not know we’re related,” Jihoon says, taking advantage of the sunscreen lotion brought for the rest of them. It makes him look even ghostlier. “Awful sense of logistics and planning, but had an artistic eye I admired. I watched his stuff religiously to know what to do and what <em>not</em> to do when starting out.”</p><p>Wonwoo does laugh at that. He raises his drink can, at which Jihoon graces him with a small smile and clink.</p><p>They take mirrored sips, after which Jihoon exhales.</p><p>“Out of curiosity, why’d you stop acting?”</p><p>A choked, citrusy cough comes out of Wonwoo’s mouth. The look Jihoon regards Wonwoo with is very sobering.</p><p>“I’d like to say that looking elsewhere was my own choice.” Wonwoo says, a bit coarse. “But you know how life is. Sometimes you end up somewhere you don’t expect, and that somewhere is objectively more practical to stay in than what you were aiming for.”</p><p>“Does that ‘somewhere’ make you happy?”</p><p>“Does being in entertainment really make anyone happy?”</p><p>“That’s fair.”</p><p>In the distance, a person or three squeals at the reveal of one topless actor after another.</p><p>Seungcheol and Mingyu have always made quite the interesting pair aesthetically. Now they look like the before and after photos of a tanning bed commercial, either direction of which is equally…good. Wonwoo does take pleasure in watching Minghao and Chaeyeon double team their glares at staff and distinctly non-staff onlookers who have wandered nearby.</p><p>“Why do you ask?” says Wonwoo.</p><p>“I find that our personalities and philosophies are quite similar. We’re also the same age,” says Jihoon, “So I wanted to get to know you beyond the job description. I guess that’s why I asked.”</p><p>“That’s comforting to hear. From you.”</p><p>“Is it?”</p><p>“Being young and successful is all the rage these days, you know. At least one of us got the memo early.”</p><p>Jihoon makes a scoffing sound. “Unless you’re doing something meaningful, being young and successful means shit, especially since you’re losing some of your best years to it. And who’s going to praise you? Mom and pop? People you don’t even know?”</p><p>Wonwoo chugs the last of his lemonade. He reaches for another. Boisterous laughter and cawing seagulls resound from far away, like the tail end of an echo.</p><p>Jihoon takes another sip. “You know, what’s <em>really</em> going to matter at your deathbed?”</p><p>“Already thinking that far ahead?”</p><p>“You say that like it’s hard, especially on days it doesn’t seem so far away.”</p><p>“Ah. Yes, I...yeah. I understand.”</p><p>“A bit morbid, admittedly, but see? Didn’t take you that long to get it. We are quite similar,” chuckles Jihoon with a pat to Wonwoo’s shoulder, “The good and the bad, but I guess you can’t have one without the other.”</p><p>A single “ha” sharply barks from Wonwoo’s mouth before he can leash the damn thing.</p><p>“Sorry, sorry,” he says, “It’s just, you sound like my grandfather whose had his whole life to figure his shit out while I’m here trying to hide the fact that my chin hasn’t stopped being barely above water since university.”</p><p>Wonwoo coughs at the awkwardness. He digs his toes into the sand. The dry heat is borderline painful when compounded by the silence.</p><p>“It’s just,” he continues, “And I don’t mean to overstep—it’s difficult for me to take our...similarities seriously when they make the differences much more obvious. You’ve clearly seen my repertoire. I’m not exactly close to ‘making it’ or however people phrase it these days.”</p><p>Another silence, and before Wonwoo can start apologizing again for saying more than he needs to, Jihoon takes his opportunity to speak.</p><p>“Are you really set on becoming a big actor one day?”</p><p>“I,” starts Wonwoo. “I mean, yeah. That’s what I got a degree for.”</p><p>“Huh. You’re a lot more old-fashioned than I took you for.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s brows pinch.</p><p>“You could say I’m privileged because I’m speaking from the other side of the fence,” says Jihoon, “And you’d be damn right because I <em>do</em> have that privilege. So trust me when I say that fixating on something you think you want isn’t nearly as satisfying as falling in love in a way you didn’t even know you could.”</p><p>“You didn’t want to be a director?”</p><p>“Teen me swore on producing music. Turns out a composition major can give you a great feel for mood and atmosphere.”</p><p>“Oh. I see.”</p><p>Wonwoo isn’t petulant enough to reject Jihoon’s words; half of the artistic signature is the guy’s masterful application of musical ambience. But it’s not like wisdom is going to duct-tape anyone’s life back together.</p><p>Wonwoo feels less appetized by his lemonade now. “So is the implication that I should be somewhere else right now? Because I can leave, if you’d be more straightforward—”</p><p>“What I’m getting at,” Jihoon interjects, pointedly, “is that if you like being here, doing what you do, let yourself enjoy it. Work is work and work can be a royal pain in the ass, obviously, but don’t let what you’ve written in your dream journal hamper you from exploring something all over again. You know well that independent film is all about trying new things. We’re trying to do that here, too. Uni isn’t the only place for exploration.”</p><p>“Arguably, uni <em>is</em> the best place for it. Fewer repercussions,” Wonwoo says, dropping onto a floppy beach chair; the folding chair with his name is at the home set, sadly. “But I get what you mean. You’re very wise for your—um, you’re very wise. Hence the grandpa comparison, I guess.”</p><p>Jihoon shrugs, slaps some sand off his forearms. “I just think a lot about this stuff, especially since I work with tons of young celebs every day. You see yourself in one of ‘em, you see yourself in them all.”</p><p>“Think About Your Deathbed rule of thumb.”</p><p>“Exactly.”</p><p>They share one more laugh before someone has to drag Jihoon away to confirm the camera setup. Beyond them is a cluster of gleaming individuals who don’t exactly match up to the glittering majesty of the seabed behind them, but the way they trip through the sand in their practice game before filming is quite entertaining.</p><p>A glance in Mingyu’s direction—he does trip, and rather spectacularly at that. But all he does afterwards is cackle on the ground about it. It’s loud and boyish and unfettered. Half his body is covered in a layer of sand as another actor helps him up before dropping him back down, though not without getting pulled into an impromptu wrestling match that gathers too much attention and even more sand for anyone to stick to today’s schedule.</p><p>Despite being alone where he sits, Wonwoo hides the shape of his mouth with his hand.</p><p>As he tries to swallow the rest of his sickly sweet and sticky drink, Wonwoo supposes he can be more amenable to trying new things. Not much of a choice, really, given what he’s been hired to do. But at least he can acknowledge it a little more properly.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“Ugh, wipe yourself <em>yourself</em>. I’m going back to the hotel lounge with how stupid exhausted I am right now<em>.”</em></p><p>Chaeyeon laughs at Minghao’s misfortune of having to damp towel-wipe Mingyu every time the guy makes out with the beach floor. Like the many other veteran employees here (and unlike the newer ones), their cold detachment to the several chiseled bodies around them is honestly quite admirable.</p><p>Wonwoo, on the other hand, feels like he might get a heat stroke at any moment. He mutters that last part out loud.</p><p>“And that’s why you need to drink more water. Not much that can keep you upright in those sweet things,” says Mingyu, sharing in the umbrella shade with a chilled water bottle in one hand and a towel in the other.</p><p>Wonwoo rolls his eyes. “Is the person who works on nearly no hours of sleep giving me lessons in taking care of my body?”</p><p>“Can’t argue with you on that, but I’d like to think I’ve been doing alright in the ‘taking care of my body’ department. What do you think?”</p><p>Oh, the self-satisfaction is <em>heavy</em>.</p><p>There are so many responses on the tip of Wonwoo’s tongue and fingers. A rapier remark about hidden egos. Thick skins. How well they must bruise after being out in the sun for so long.</p><p>Wonwoo would be the first to sneer at the stupidity of his own simple urges. But when one has only taken someone else in small flashes of skin—a tilted neck, slivers between rings, bare wrists with a watch-shaped tan—seeing a much wider expanse of it is jarring. At least the weather is an easy excuse for whatever color his cheeks might be.</p><p>Mingyu offers the bottle. Wonwoo takes it by the cap, keeping his eyes trained on the dripping, plastic label where Mingyu’s grip has now travelled to a dropped-off bottle of sunscreen oil. Something is yelled about filming again in a half hour. Always, there is a schedule.</p><p>Accidental glimpses of the application process prompts Wonwoo to busy himself with hydrating. He’s read somewhere that he should be drinking twice as much this time of year.</p><p>“You look like your head is going to melt off your shoulders,” Mingyu says exasperatedly. “I’ve met a number of lyricists who are always drowning in their thoughts, but the mental gymnastics seem especially intense for you.”</p><p>Wonwoo says, “You’d understand if you wrote your own materials.”</p><p>“A jab at a celebrity who doesn’t make their own stuff? Haven’t heard that one before.”</p><p>“Hm, you might be right about the heat, must be getting to my head. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s getting to yours as well, talking to me like that.”</p><p>A low, rumbling laugh melts into the space between them.</p><p>“If you’re not too busy critiquing my performance or weaponizing your thoughts against me at every waking moment,” says Mingyu, tone light, “I could use some help. Don’t worry, it won’t damage your very many writing calluses.”</p><p>Well, someone drank too much salt water today. A phrase more seething nearly escapes Wonwoo’s mouth, but it stays where it belongs when he sees what Mingyu means.</p><p>There is a large, almost opaque stretch of sand spread across Mingyu’s back, exactly where it would be hard for a single person to reach himself. And the whole thing would be hilarious if it weren’t for the dips and edges and uniform color of skin in every direction—in addition to the request itself, of course.</p><p>Wonwoo is even more conscious of his own skin despite being covered up.</p><p>“You couldn’t get someone else to do it for you?” he asks despite the step he takes forward.</p><p>“Imagine the stir I would cause by asking Chae to do it, or even a cast member,” Mingyu says matter-of-factly. He tosses the damp towel over his shoulder. Wonwoo snatches it. “With Minghao taking his break, this is clearly the safest option.”</p><p>And yet most have already fled to the nearby hotel for air conditioning, leaving behind few eyes with the knowledge of Wonwoo’s place here.</p><p>Cleaning the sand looks like an easy broad swipe or two, and the thought of doing so before shoving Mingyu back into the sand is very, <em>very</em> tempting. But the cockiness of this half-naked chucklehead, who didn’t even bother with formalities this time, tells Wonwoo that a lesson in patience is far more necessary.</p><p>
  <em>Don’t even try to tell me</em> all <em>the shit you pull on New Suzy is ‘for his own good.’</em>
</p><p>The humidity is suffocating when Wonwoo is close enough for his breath to hit skin, enough to cause a visible shiver from Mingyu’s nape all the way to the small of his back. The waistband of his trunks is lopsided. Wonwoo does not fix it. As if the heat isn’t unbearable enough, the natural warmth of Mingyu’s skin seems to radiate twice as strongly, like a branding iron, and Wonwoo is quite prone to scarring.</p><p>He wraps the towel around his hand and brushes it between Mingyu’s hair and neck. “You missed here.”</p><p>“Really, now."</p><p>"You heard me clearly."</p><p>"Pretty sure Minghao started with the face and head.”</p><p>“I lied, then. So?”</p><p>Mingyu’s shoulders are broader when they’re tense.</p><p>“You’re tense,” Wonwoo vocalizes selectively, now doing what was actually asked of him. He has time to be meticulous. “Relax. I’m not going to bite you.”</p><p>“<em>This</em> time.”</p><p>“What was that?”</p><p>“You often have this expression of wanting to bite my head off,” is the explanation, evenly, “Especially whenever I flub a line during filming. At least you have the decency to not scold me in front of everyone.”</p><p>Strange thoughts about rookie treatment pass by Wonwoo’s mind before he shakes it off, says instead, “You say that like you’ve imagined me scolding you publicly before.”</p><p>“And if I have?”</p><p>It’s said with the same awful, dripping tone Wonwoo used to boast about lying.</p><p>Before he can think better of it, he pinches somewhere along Mingyu’s waist, <em>hard</em>, which earns a good squawking noise despite the composure quickly gathered. Such is the reaction time of an ex-idol. But a redness still blooms there, like a rose bud at the forefront of spring and it would be quite the sight if it wasn’t so easy to cover up.</p><p>Mingyu darts out a hand to rub the place instinctually, but Wonwoo is much less quick to act than think, so his fingers are caught in the fire.</p><p>“I’m starting to get the impression that you have a thing for pinching,” Mingyu says. “Not that I mind, really.”</p><p>“I should do it more often, then, if it gets you to behave.”</p><p>“Maybe. It’s more like—well, if you feel like you’re letting go of yourself a little when you do, be my guest. It’s been really stressful for you recently, hasn’t it?”</p><p>Wonwoo coughs on the dryness in his throat.</p><p>Mingyu turns his head to gaze over his shoulder. He looks warm, <em>sounds</em> warm, even borderline sweet which is absurd given what has transpired. Wonwoo replays it all in his mind and is dizzy with a full-body flush, especially as the pressure of a palm slowly blankets the back of his hand like a hot compress for aching joints. Surely, he might actually get a heat stroke.</p><p>A one-handed sweep is enough to dust off the rest of the sand from Mingyu’s back. It would be two-handed if Wonwoo was confident enough to pull back and test Mingyu’s resolve.</p><p>“Are you done yet?” prompts Mingyu, muscles tensing again but this time in preparation. “You should hurry up so we can get to the water.”</p><p>Wonwoo flinches. <em>“What?”</em> And that’s more than enough for Mingyu to get a proper grip around Wonwoo’s hand and drag him from beneath the umbrella shade.</p><p>Surprise makes Wonwoo clumsy, so he is even clumsier on sand. Mingyu has had enough practice to keep them both upright whenever a stumble or two arises. He even manages to dash past one of the beach towels to grab his cap and stick it on Wonwoo’s head with a finesse so disarming, Wonwoo can’t work up the courage to resist any longer.</p><p>Did he remember I didn’t touch up my sunscreen? Wonwoo wonders. Is he trying to hide my face? From the public? Was he thinking on the fly, or did he plan this all along?</p><p>And suddenly, there is a hit of water at his feet and the pungent smell of salt water.</p><p>Memories come flooding in of the time Wonwoo, too, filmed on a beach. Fresh out of college. Twenty-one. Barely a filmography to his name. A graduated sunbae in the industry had recommended him for an independent film about two students, a boy and a girl, from a small seaside town in the 80’s who were dared to have sex on the first night of a school field trip. They tried. Then they couldn’t. But they confided their secrets in each other and found a connection they never anticipated finding there, of all places.</p><p>The actual splicing and color editing and timing were absolutely awful among other things, but no one could escape from the bittersweetness of a genuine friendship grown from inevitable tragedy. It was a beautiful film, in that way.</p><p>“Be careful, there are some rocks. Here, hold my other hand,” instructs Mingyu as he guides Wonwoo further beyond shore. “Doesn’t it feel nice? The water? Especially since it’s so hot this time of year.”</p><p>“It’s as nice as—ow, <em>ow</em>—as nice as walking on eggshells,” Wonwoo bites back as a particularly sharp rock pokes at his feet. “How are you not feeling any of this?”</p><p>“Dance practice calluses.”</p><p>A laugh comes out, strangely untethered. “That. That makes a lot of sense.” Wonwoo involuntarily squeezes Mingyu’s hands as he treads further, water now up to his shins. “I never took you for a beach kind of guy. I assumed you’d be too wrapped up in all your photoshoots and fan meets and such.”</p><p>“My old group actually had this tradition of visiting a beach in the middle of the night and shouting our career goals at the ocean. Getting awards, breaking records and such. They never came true.” A shrug. “But it was something that helped us bond. I kind of miss doing it.”</p><p>“You can still do it. With the team you have now.”</p><p>“It seems silly to do, especially now that I have so much. More than enough, you know, to wish for even more.”</p><p>Inexplicably, Mingyu looks younger when he says that. Wonwoo would even daresay he sees himself somewhere in there.</p><p>“Contentment doesn’t mean,” his throat tightens, he didn’t mean to speak in reflex, “Contentment doesn’t mean that you can’t have or want more. You work hard, you love what you do, and you…seem to make a lot of people happy. If that ‘more’ makes you happier, then I think you’re deserving of it.”</p><p>Mingyu’s eyes and mouth soften. Unbearably so.</p><p>“A-Anyhow,” continues Wonwoo, feeling warm all over again, “You should really be taking a break right now, you know. I don’t think you’ve eaten since. Since…”</p><p>The words trail off.</p><p>God, Mingyu looks stunning.</p><p>He looks like everything a star should look like: grand in stature and stance, barely-damp hair curling gently from the sea salt, sun freckles on his shoulders like young constellations. Ridiculously, Wonwoo imagines connecting the dots. And more than any of that, even more than whatever foolish things could be tacked on about the other obvious views Mingyu provides—the purity of his smile is what really robs Wonwoo of whatever breath he had left. He looks so young and unduly passionate in a way that's sung about young lovers during the summertime. A person could drown in those smile lines, in those crinkled eyes. It would be so easy.</p><p>Worst of all, Mingyu is backlit by the brightest, bluest sky Wonwoo has seen in the longest time.</p><p>Even from the beach umbrella, nothing really compares to stepping into the ocean, hearing the gulls and winds and rolling water around them, before looking up into the infinite space above the horizon. It seems so untouched, and open, with only one other person here.</p><p>Everything else feels so much smaller by comparison and it’s almost…comforting.</p><p>“Hyung?”</p><p>Wonwoo realizes that he’s slack-jawed so he promptly closes his mouth, locks it, brings his gaze down to water lapping at his skin.</p><p>“This would be such a great shot for the next scene,” he says, slipping his hands away. A familiar, cotton feeling crawls its way into his throat. “Even better at sunset.”</p><p>The deceptively perceptive person Mingyu is doesn’t try to pull Wonwoo back in. But the splash of water suggests his movement, enough to stand between Wonwoo and the rays of the sun like the annoying gentlemanly thing to do.</p><p>In the distance, the sound of activity is low but growing slowly. Wonwoo turns around and feels the heat beating on his back.</p><p>“We should go back,” he says, “Can’t have you being late again, can we?”</p><p>When they pass by the set beach towel, Wonwoo places the cap back where it was before, as if it was never taken in the first place.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“You look like you need an Advil. Or a Klondike Bar. Neither of which I’m volunteering to get, by the way, because I already do so much for you.”</p><p>Jun is toeing off his shoes at the door of Wonwoo’s hotel room. One of them had cited a stomachache to miss dinner, and by the poorly packaged catering in Jun’s hands, it wasn’t him.</p><p>“Fuck me,” curses Wonwoo into his hands. “I can’t keep doing this. This is such a mess and the worst part is that I keep. Letting it. Happen. And <em>Joshua</em> is even coming to set tomorrow. Should I just leave? Would people notice if I left? Don’t answer, stupid question.”</p><p>“Must be bad enough to get you rambling,” says Jun, with pity. “You should eat first. If you don’t, I suspect that I might have some hounds on my tail even though your stubbornness is hardly my business anymore.”</p><p>Wonwoo scowls as he walks over to the desk and starts poking through Jun’s delivery; looks like good ol’ Korean food today. “Don’t lie, you’re enjoying every minute of this.”</p><p>“Watching you? In shambles almost every damn day because of a pretty boy too honest for his own good? And then you also have to deal with the ex-pretty boy who is the now-pretty’s boy’s ex-acting coach? Of <em>course </em>I’m enjoying this. Maybe you should write something out of it so other people can enjoy it, too.”</p><p>“Let’s finish milking my personal life with this project first.”</p><p>Jun laughs a little, as he generally does at Wonwoo’s misfortune, but he still has enough heart to care.</p><p>Wonwoo says, “I really shouldn’t be doing this with him. Right? His career is in such a delicate place right now and I’m his god damn sunbae. Hyung. Sunbae. Whatever. But can you imagine the shitshow that would happen if word got out that we, we—”</p><p>“That you were giving each other eye sex under a beach umbrella?” Jun fills in while Wonwoo groans into his food. “Sorry, <em>romantic</em> eye sex. If it’s any help, that sounds a lot more like a porn plot than something that actually happened.”</p><p>“That, in fact, does not help.”</p><p>“You’re not denying that it happened.”</p><p>Wonwoo bites the answer at the bud and grumbles around a mouthful of purple rice, “Why is it so hard for me to have a simple life? Go to work, go home, repeat. Meet someone cute at a bar who has nothing to do with the entertainment industry so it doesn’t feel like every part of my life is ruled by it. I just want enough free time and energy to adopt a cat. I didn’t want any of, of <em>this.”</em></p><p>“What’d you say you said to New Suzy again? That wanting more is okay?”</p><p>Wonwoo turns sharply with a reply he doesn’t have, only to find Jun picking the dirt, probably sand, from his nails. Visions of sand elsewhere arise from a cage Wonwoo forgot to lock.</p><p>“You could try listening to yourself for once. You’re also not the type to settle, and you’re not good at convincing yourself of that, either,” says Jun. “As you’re probably figuring out with this gig, more is hard. So why not try learning how to deal with it?”</p><p>“New things and more things,” Wonwoo echoes, staring hard at the mirror mounted on the wall in front of him, then back at his food, “Because I definitely needed extra <em>things</em> on my plate.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="script">
  <p>CHUNGHEE pulls the beach towel over his feet, feeling the coldness of the evening ocean air. Inadvertently, he does the same for JAESANG.</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">How did that weird American saying go again? The one at the weddings? My sister got married to a white guy and mentioned it, but I forgot.</p>
  <p class="character">CHUNGHEE</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I think I know what you’re talking about. It’s around the lines of: “Something more, something new, something borrowed, something...true?”</p>
  <p class="character">JAESANG</p>
  <p class="dialogue">I’m pretty sure there’s something about a color in there, but that sounds about right to me.</p>
</div><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Didn’t see you at dinner, hopefully Mister Wen got some for you. If you’re feeling better tomorrow night, do you want to try out the night market nearby? I’ve heard the seafood there is really, really good. -MG</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Joshua Hong</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Hey Won, sorry I haven’t gotten back to you sooner. Been a bit busy. But how does dinner sound? I’m visiting the set tomorrow. Let me know if you’re free.</em>
</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Ah yes, the inherent eroticism of Tall ’n Bratty But Sincere Hottie Himbo half naked on a beach with significantly more clothed Sexually Adventurous but Frequently Existential Intellectual. But you know what’s even sexier? A pseudo therapy session for your quarter-life crisis with one (1) Lee Jihoon. Gimme <i>that</i> Y/N fic, please.</p><p>Okay, now I’m going to take a 3-week break before posting the next update, just to give myself extra time to work on the last couple parts. In the meantime, I’d love to know what you thought of this chapter! ✨Self-care✨</p><p> </p><p>  <a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com">tumblr</a></p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>Wonwoo remembers the first film he starred in. Well, the first “proper” one.</p><p><em>Bada-ui Seonmul</em>, or <em>Miracles by the Sea</em> for the short stint it had as a subtitled trailer to pass over on streaming sites. He always found the title uninspired, but he liked it enough for what it represented—a connection between two lost souls who still clung to their thread of desires. Nothing short of miraculous, and it just so happened next to a shit ton of water. Go figure.</p><p>Set in Korea in vaguely the 80’s in an even more vague seaside town, a school field trip gave suffocating adolescents their first taste of freedom, enough to dare a quiet girl and outspoken but unliked boy to have sex. They knew each other by proximity and nothing more, yet the strangeness of the arrangement was outweighed by the pressure of being shunned for the rest of their school lives. So they agreed, or at least they couldn’t say no.</p><p>They still couldn’t do it in the end. The girl confessed she had a crush on another girl, a close friend, whom she knew could never return those feelings. The boy confessed his dream of running to Seoul, where there were fast cars and giant buildings and pretty people who can make other people smile.</p><p>Wonwoo’s favorite part is his co-lead reciting the lines, <em>“Well, it might not be enough, but you made me smile.”</em></p><p>And he replied, eyes glistening and smiling himself, <em>“It’s more than enough. Thank you.”</em></p><p>He still keeps in touch with her, at least whenever she has the free time. She’s become quite the fine actress these days.</p><p>Sometimes, it can take lifetimes to find someone who cares enough to listen to you, let alone try to understand what you’re going through. That single point in an otherwise awful film makes the experience a close one in his heart for the fact that it felt like a rare intersection of two people who cared for, listened to, and understood each other on a level rarely appreciated in bigger entertainment. It was love, more than anything.</p><p>Wonwoo returns to this film occasionally. That moment often seems too good in the way films and stories make relationships too extraordinary. But it’s still nice to watch now and again, looking back on how deep he dug to play his role. He has to remind himself that one response, one person, is sometimes all it takes to find purpose in your dreams.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>
    <em>Miracles by the Sea</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>FIN.</em>
  </p>
</div><table>
  <tbody>
<tr>
    <td><em>Director</em></td>
    <td>Lee Kangin</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Screenplay</em></td>
    <td>Lee Kangin</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td> </td>
    <td>Park Hyejun</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Producer</em></td>
    <td>Cho Byunghee</td>
  </tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>Lead Cast</p>
</div><table>
  
  <tbody>
<tr>
    <td><em>Bae Kyungmi</em></td>
    <td>Cho Yunhee</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Kim Dongmin</em></td>
    <td>Jeon Wonwoo</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Lee Yunhee</em></td>
    <td>Lee Eunji</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Mi Sunghwa</em></td>
    <td>Dong Jinho</td>
  </tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>Supporting Cast</p>
</div><table>
  <tbody>
<tr>
    <td><em>Yeo Hyunjae</em></td>
    <td>Kim Taesang</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Kim Daehyun</em></td>
    <td>Park Sookho</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Kyungmi's mother</em></td>
    <td>Moon Yebin</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Kyungmi's father</em></td>
    <td>Park Jongsuk</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Kyungmi's brother</em></td>
    <td>Kim Kyungsoon</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Dongmin's mother</em></td>
    <td>Hyeon Jiyoung</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Shin Young-il</em></td>
    <td>Kim Jiwoo</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Bae Kyungmi (child)</em></td>
    <td>Chae Seyeon</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Bae Kyungmi (child)</em></td>
    <td>Chae Seyeon</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Kim Dongmin (child)</em></td>
    <td>Park Young-in</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Im Haneul</em></td>
    <td>Jang Eunkyung</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Park Inho</em></td>
    <td>Jeon Munhee</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Extras</em></td>
    <td>Jo Haemi</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>Kim Daewon</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>Yang Hyun</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>Park Changmin</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>Kim Mingyu</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>Do Junghee</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>Shin Minjung</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>...</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>...</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>...</td>
  </tr>
</tbody>
</table><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>In Wonwoo’s defense, the movie was filmed a <em>long </em>time ago.</p><p>That, and the box office reception didn’t exactly leave much incentive for reminiscing on the credit sequence. The score for the credits wasn’t great, either, and it’s very easy to turn him off with mediocre soundtracks.</p><p>“If it’s any consolation, I never noticed at all, either,” Soonyoung says, staring blankly at his computer screen after yelling out the name only moments post-indulgent rewatch. Wonwoo called an emergency Skype movie night for some <em>relaxation</em>, damn it, and this ain’t it. “It’s not like we ever had the need to look—not that we still need to, but, well, you know what I mean.”</p><p>Wonwoo really wishes he didn’t, but he does know what Soonyoung means. Mingyu’s name wasn’t exactly household back then.</p><p>Wonwoo’s only reply is: “He told me he was in a movie before. Before his group broke up.”</p><p>“Yeah, you mentioned.” Soonyoung pauses, then,“Was this…?”</p><p>At least Soonyoung has the mind to quit his rhetorical question in its midst, knowing full well what the answer was.</p><p>This <em>is</em> that movie. It must be. There was brief mention of a small film long ago that Mingyu had been in, and Mingyu isn’t exactly a prolific actor. It wouldn’t surprise Wonwoo if the poor film was wiped from Mingyu’s reputation entirely, just to maintain that new pristine shine. If that’s true, Wonwoo wouldn’t find himself insulted.</p><p>More than that, he finds himself growing anxious by the second—<em>He saw me do that crying scene a dozen times. And when I tripped into the ocean twice. Did we talk? No, couldn’t have, I only interacted with the main cast. Was Yunhee the “sunbae”? Was </em>I <em>the sunbae? Shit. </em>Shit—and, if you asked him then, Wonwoo couldn’t have begun to pinpoint why.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>To: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Please tell Mingyu that I’m unfortunately allergic to fish. Maybe a different time and place.</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“You look like you want to be somewhere else.”</p><p>“Literally or figuratively?”</p><p>“Now that you mention it, maybe both,” says Joshua, chuckling. A finger taps on the condensation of his beer bottle. “If that’s the case, I appreciate the time you’ve carved out of your schedule to be here.”</p><p>In the middle of an evening dry heat, he and Wonwoo are sitting in a restaurant selling cold noodles, one of the more contentious dishes for foreign tourists but it always tastes equal parts nostalgic and refreshing. Joshua has already finished most of his share, including the gochujang and sides, while Wonwoo has finished enough to probably get an ahjumma nagging about not eating enough if any zeroed in on him now.</p><p>“I appreciate the script you’ve written. Quite a lot.”</p><p>Wonwoo very much expected this and he still has the abysmal self-control to twitch at the acknowledgement.</p><p>“Not gonna lie, that was sort of weird to hear. Sorry I don’t,” he says, “I don’t mean to be awkward or, erm, rude about this.”</p><p>“That’s okay, I know this is pretty strange. You don’t write about a past relationship intending to have a conversation with the ex in question about it. And while that story is in the middle of being filmed, no less.”</p><p>“Honestly, the gravity of things in my past has been catching up to me as of late.”</p><p>“Because I’m here?”</p><p>Wonwoo pft’s. “Don’t flatter yourself.”</p><p>Jest helps ground what felt like a floating conversation. Blame it on the dry heat so strong that it penetrates even the sturdiest air conditioners. But in seeing the classic crinkle to Joshua’s soft gaze, something in Wonwoo feels like it’s melting against his will. He’d been weak to how that look of Joshua’s is indomitably forgiving—and it still is—but now Wonwoo has the mind to not fall for it so quickly.</p><p>“So,” he says, “What’ve you been up to since uni?”</p><p>Joshua’s expression falters, like a framed picture on a wall tilting slightly.</p><p>“Sorry, again. I just,” Wonwoo digs a fingernail into the table varnish. “I just want to know what happened.”</p><p>“I understand. That’s what we’re here for, right?” says Joshua, sighing but with good meaning. “Just as I said back then, I moved back to the states after graduating. I was in New York City for those first few years. NYC is the east coast hub for anyone looking to be in American entertainment.”</p><p>“Not interested in California?”</p><p>“That’s not where Broadway is.”</p><p>“Right.”</p><p>Joshua takes a sip of his beer. It must be lukewarm by now. “Imagine figuring out in your mid-twenties that you’re a musical theater kid. Church choir should’ve given away the ‘musical’ part, really. But I guess I was stubborn about keeping some creative part of myself just for myself, you know?”</p><p>“Yeah,” says Wonwoo, “I know.”</p><p>The restaurant entrance chimes. In enters a mother and her young son, both of whom seem to know the owners by the familiarity in their greeting. Absent father, looks like. Wonwoo can see Joshua’s eyes finding the pair before returning to axis.</p><p>Wonwoo asks, “How’s New York been, then?”</p><p>Joshua shrugs. “It didn’t get easier, not when there’s always another Asian around the corner trying to be that ethnic rep. But I will say that this new obsession with Koreans has helped with auditions. Very marginally, but I’ll take anything.”</p><p>Wonwoo watches Joshua chuckle through the words.</p><p>“I can already see the headlines,” says Wonwoo, “‘Broadway’s newest star could be mistaken for a K-pop idol.’ I think that’s pretty catchy.”</p><p>“An idol? With <em>this</em> American tan?”</p><p>“Hey, times are changing in the motherland. The spectrum is widening every day. I’d like to think this film will help with that, on more than one spectrum.”</p><p>Joshua’s eyes light up and with a glow that pulls around his signature smile, the one that commands the rest of his features to follow. Like muscle memory, Wonwoo smiles back and it feels…okay still. Not wrong, or defensive.</p><p>“I wanted to go back to LA, actually, when I told you I was moving,” Joshua continues. “Korea’s my home but California’s my...my <em>home</em>. The fact that my dad’s been ill recently doesn’t help.”</p><p>“I’m sorry to hear that. I remember. I remember you weren’t very fond of him.”</p><p>“That much hasn’t changed.”</p><p>“Was moving back really difficult?”</p><p>A dimple forms in Joshua’s jaw before it disappears.</p><p>“Being on opposite sides of the same country felt safe at first,” he says, “Like I still had my own life, had control. But it was also that much harder to separate myself from family. The ‘privileges’ of an only child, I guess.”</p><p>“And the firstborn son—well, by default. That shit’s rough, isn’t it?”</p><p>Joshua raises his brows at the same time he raises his cup: <em>to bullshit filial responsibilities based on outdated age hierarchies and gender expectations. </em>Wonwoo is more than happy to clink to that with his half-melted ice half-Coke.</p><p>“I couldn’t stand being there, so I moved back to Korea,” Joshua says. “It might sound like a weird choice, given where all the values I despised started from, but I felt like this was how I was going to come to terms with them. That, and there was a pretty sweet paycheck on private tutoring here.”</p><p>“Coaching actors, yeah?”</p><p>“And teaching English.”</p><p>“Wait, Mingyu’s learning English?”</p><p>“Yeah, you should hear him. It’s pretty cute.”</p><p>When Wonwoo coughs on the lip of his cup, Joshua offers both a scoff and admittedly well-placed pity.</p><p>“So much time together, yet we still know so little,” he pokes. “Should’ve known he was your type.”</p><p>“It’s strictly professional—”</p><p>“And you were <em>so</em> good at following that boundary in the past.”</p><p>The forbidden card has been placed and now Joshua is straight-up laughing, having evolved completely from insisting that he’d laugh <em>with</em> <em>you, I promise</em> whenever teasing turned into such a fit.</p><p>Wonwoo just shoves his half-eaten noodles towards his dinner companion. It would be rude to leave it unfinished.</p><p>“When your life is so entrenched in your work, it’s bound to happen,” he mumbles. “He’ll get tired of it, I’m sure. I’m a sunbae with a small-time career. He’s got so much more ahead of him. This is just—it’s just some fun. For both of us.”</p><p>Wonwoo says that despite the tangled sensation in his chest, despite the entirely different face and voice and body occupying ‘just some fun’ in his mind. He’s usually quite convincing, but rarely to himself. Maybe he should take those noodles back. To wash down the lie in his mouth.</p><p>Joshua realizes this, moves as if to do exactly as Wonwoo thought. But instead, he covers Wonwoo’s hand—stops him from scratching the table with a fingernail, a bad habit—in such a way that Wonwoo almost thinks he’ll develop a new bad habit from another sharp twitch. But he welcomes it this time, if at least for the cool sensation after handling the chilled metal bowls.</p><p>“Trust me when I say that I know that position. Quite intimately,” says Joshua knowing full well the internal wringing it would give Wonwoo. “You can argue about how I’m biased and I won’t rebut. You could even tell me that it’s inappropriate to bring up the past like this and I wouldn’t have a single argument to offer. But wouldn’t it be a little sad if even <em>you</em> couldn’t believe in the story you’d written?”</p><p>“I,” Wonwoo’s eyes widen, “I didn’t write...”</p><p>Oh, yes, but Wonwoo did. And he still is, given the unsent emails with edits of the last two scenes.</p><p>So the hoobae has become the sunbae, the dongsaeng growing up into the hyung. It’s cruel, really, how much life imitates art imitates life. With a cycle like this, can anyone really be convinced of a distinction?</p><p>“I don’t expect you to do as I did. Hell, there are days I look back and regret how I treated us. Treated you,” insists Joshua, hand returning to warmth again. A squeeze for comfort, then it’s gone for courtesy. “But I could never regret being with you, if you’ve ever thought that. At the time, boundaries were nothing. Naively, perhaps, I still believe in that, if crossing that line can make a person happier.”</p><p>Without control, Wonwoo scrapes out of his chest, “Were you happier?”</p><p>“Yes. Unquestionably.”</p><p>“So why...”</p><p>“Maybe it was selfishness, why I left,” says Joshua, “There was still a part of me that wanted to prove that acting was the right choice to make. That choice so happened to bring me to America. I still wonder if it makes me as happy, as I keep saying it does.”</p><p>His eyes drift towards the mother and son a few tables away with little attempt to hide it. Wonwoo can’t understand, but he can empathize. Simple validations are hard to come by, especially from the people you need them from the most sometimes.</p><p>Suddenly, Joshua dips his head down in what Wonwoo, in his panic, realizes is a bow. “I really am sorry, if you’ve ever felt hampered by what I’ve said to you in the past.”</p><p>Wonwoo frantically waves his hands. “No no no, I think <em>I</em> should apologize! I didn’t know that all of those things were going on in your life and I—I know what you mean. I’m still figuring all that out, too.”</p><p>“Are you happier?”</p><p>The question catches Wonwoo off-guard, especially knowing that what is being asked is different.</p><p>Lips pursed, eyes darting from a soon-to-be second empty bowl and the busy but attentive expression on Joshua’s face, Wonwoo answers with:</p><p>“I don’t think so, at least not tremendously. But I think I will be.”</p><p>“Good,” says Joshua. “Knowing you, you’re more than just your words.”</p><p>A proper warmth hits Wonwoo for the first time in ages from that voice. From that statement, said like a fact.</p><p>It feels like the boulder on his shoulders, starved of momentum, has finally found its way down the hill it’s lived on for years. And while moving uphill is still as dangerous as it sounds, the shadow of its peak is no longer as looming or as dark. It’s just a single person, and gravity.</p><p>“Now that <em>I’ve</em> caught up quite a bit with you,” Joshua grins through his long-perfected mask of grace. “It’s about time <em>you</em> catch up with me.”</p><p>Wonwoo would normally roll eyes at the idea of sharing anything with little purpose of being elsewhere but his own mind.</p><p>But considering all that has happened then, he crosses his legs under the table, intertwines his fingers and rests his chin there.</p><p>“You know what?” says Wonwoo. “Sure. I could use a little trip down memory lane myself.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>(The budget distribution had been so bad, they were forced to get their own snacks between filming hours.</p><p>“I refuse.”</p><p>“Oh c’mon, everyone’s just realizing how warm and fuzzy you are underneath that cold front you’re so stubborn about keeping up,” Yunhee had said. She’d gotten into this big fit with the hair stylists a while ago, but Wonwoo thought the bob made her look cute. “You’re a real deal softie, my friend.”</p><p>Wonwoo scoffed. “Why can’t <em>you</em> pay? Since you’re the actual lead.”</p><p>“Don’t sell yourself short like that, you’re just as important.”</p><p>“I don’t mind being less important if it keeps my wallet heavier.”</p><p>“Stingy.” Yunhee pouted. “Fine, let’s be good sunbaes together, then. How about I buy for the girls and you buy for the guys? Good? Great!”</p><p>She quickly latched on to a passing conversation between two of only a handful of other actresses before Wonwoo could get in a single protest. The ratio, as usual, was not in his favor.</p><p>Truth was that Wonwoo had rarely interacted with the other actors beyond the three he was obligated to, being part of the main cast and all. There were faces, character names, and...that’s all he really needed to get by. Call it a poor man’s method acting.</p><p>The girls were usually good-natured about it, choosing to humble Wonwoo by repeating the ridiculous things Yunhee spouts about him because Wonwoo dislikes it (good-naturedly) ninety percent of the time. And the boys—well, emotions either run like ice or boiling water with them. Jealousy is often sung to the tune of competition.</p><p>Wonwoo did as Yunhee said anyway.</p><p>So he went to the closest H Mart, bought some things, came back to the old school building they used for a set. Two classrooms were repurposed into pseudo dressing rooms; unironically, ugly printouts of clipart and watermarked stock photos were taped to the doors to indicate who should go where.</p><p>“Happy birthday to no one in particular,” Wonwoo announced as he maneuvered the sliding door with his foot. “Before anyone asks, no I don’t have enough money to buy actual food, but snacks are better than nothing so…”</p><p>One other person was in the room.</p><p>Maybe the other young actors had given Wonwoo such wide berth that they disappeared entirely. Maybe they were straight-up avoiding him. They always liked Yunhee more, but it’s not hard to when the star power thrives in someone like her.</p><p>As for this other person, Wonwoo didn’t get a good look. The details of those eyes and nose and mouth were shrouded by what was behind him.</p><p>Sundown filled an entire wall of windows. Vapor wave colors rushed in like waterfalls of light after winter. Could skies really be that pink? And purple? And so brightly, fleetingly blue? Air escaped Wonwoo’s chest with the intention of joining whatever it is out there—and Wonwoo fully understood in the moment. This was a view of the sky that would wrench the breath out of anyone with working eyes.</p><p>It was just so…<em>freeing </em>to look at. It was as if anything Wonwoo said now wouldn’t matter, especially without a camera to catch him saying it.</p><p>“Ah,” started the other person before immediately going bashful because he was using the room for what it was meant for: changing clothes. He quickly tried to redress. He sounded like he’d been crying. “I-I’m sorry, sunbae, I didn’t know that you were coming in.”</p><p>Wonwoo walked in and set the goods onto a desk.</p><p>“Between you and me,” he said, leaning against it, “I wouldn’t mind if you took them all. The snacks, I mean. And here,” he held out a handkerchief, “Tough day? I can leave you be.”</p><p>The person jumped a little at the gesture, hesitating, before gently accepting the offer. “Th-Thank you. And you don’t have to! I-I mean, I’d be rude to tell you that, after you were kind enough to bring snacks.”</p><p>“Nonsense, people need their space. I’m not the type of person to get mad at you for wanting that. So should I…?”</p><p>“No, no it’s. It’s alright.”</p><p>“Bad breakup or something?”</p><p>“Something like that,” said the person.</p><p>Then, Wonwoo heard the loudest, ugliest nose-blowing sound he had ever heard.</p><p>Words have accumulated in his throat since the start of his career. He learned to spit them out like darts at a board made solely of bullseyes when needed, and there are moments on this set when they really are. But those words stayed down, even parting to make room for what absurdly sounded like a laugh.</p><p>Wonwoo was definitely delirious. He didn’t get much sleep the night before, and something about the beautiful emptiness of the place was jarring enough to finally lose control.</p><p>There’s a special kind of nostalgia inextricable from a classroom at sunset—this idea of being so young yet struck with feeling too close to the end. Like a single chapter in a book series crawling to its very last paragraph, but the main character doesn’t know there’s more to come.</p><p>Wonwoo eventually noticed the person staring at him. He looked stunned. Wonwoo couldn’t blame him.</p><p>“I’m sorry, I promise it’s not you. I’m usually much better about this so I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” he wheezed, palming a tear away. “I really am sorry that you have to go through that.”</p><p>Fidget, pause, words lost to a second thought to not say them. The guy seemed a little more relaxed, at least.</p><p>“Unrelated,” diverted Wonwoo, mildly embarrassed now, “But it’s been a while since we finished early enough to get to see the sun start to set. The sky is so clear.”</p><p>“It’s less smoggy here than in the city.”</p><p>“That’s true. You sound like you watch the sun set often.”</p><p>“Sunbae films for so long, you’re probably too busy to see it.”</p><p>Right. That’s a strange title Wonwoo was new to.</p><p>“I hear Americans call it ‘golden hour,’” he said. “The light is a pretty color.”</p><p>Wonwoo glanced at this other person, this maybe-extra who still hadn’t changed clothes and kept glancing between Wonwoo and the floor because he probably didn’t want Wonwoo catching him doing the former.</p><p>More than that, this person’s silhouette, despite that woefully cheap costume of a school uniform against the deeply bronze, warm glow of the tired sun, he looked like every single dream of a school drama in one tall, slightly hunched, slightly nervous glass. What was it filled with? Wonwoo wondered. Ambition still? The usual hopes and dreams? A different career entirely?</p><p>“You look like an actor,” he commented, entirely sober but loosened on the moment, “And you sound like you work hard to be one. I hope there are people out there who support you.”</p><p>“I. I hope so, too.”</p><p>“I support you.”</p><p>“You, you,” the person sounded legitimately flustered, “You do? But, we haven’t, it’s not like I’ve ever really—”</p><p>“Do I need to know you to want to support you?” Wonwoo interjected, knowing where that line of dialogue is probably going. <em>I haven’t done anything to deserve your support.</em> “You could probably stand up straighter, though. You’d look better if you did.”</p><p>Indeed, Wonwoo’s investment was…strange. He was aware of it, too, in the moment. Looking back, he probably blamed it on the transience—infinite skies, uncaring; a new day encroaching on this old one; the tail end of filming; a classroom they can never truly return to; and the most imperfect stranger, a novice in his profession who knows Wonwoo but isn’t really known by him. Outside this room, nothing will really matter.</p><p>“Thank you,” said the person, out of the blue. “I really needed to hear that.”</p><p>“...the support thing or the standing straight thing?”</p><p>“Erm, both?”</p><p>Wonwoo chuckled.</p><p>This actor then held out Wonwoo’s handkerchief, wet droplets between the neat folds. Something about seeing it in different hands almost makes Wonwoo laugh again. If he did, then he’d have a legitimate reason for being a little out of breath.</p><p>All that, for a tall, imperfect stranger who never even introduced himself in the end. How funny.)</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Big scene in a few days and he’s nervous as hell. Do you mind practicing with him tonight? He keeps saying that he doesn’t want to, but we know he needs it. Let me know if you’re available.</em>
</p><p>
  <b>To: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Is Joshua not returning to coach him?</em>
</p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Not for the film. You’re still the one contracted.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>But if you’d like him to coach instead, I can arrange it.</em>
</p><p>
  <b>To: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>No, it’s alright. Thank you for the clarification.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Let Mingyu know to expect me. Text me a time and room number.</em>
</p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>It’s not exactly</em>
</p><p>
  <em>*It’s not exactly a room</em>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“I can’t believe you’ve got an entire…hut? To yourself?”</p><p>“Mini villa, more like. The company says it’s for safety.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s eyebrow raises.</p><p>“Not even Chae is allowed to be here,” says Mingyu, chuckling and dressed simply in a t-shirt and loose shorts. “Keeping the film under wraps is hard enough without some misunderstandings.”</p><p>Wonwoo nods simply for the gesture. Mingyu steps aside to let him through.</p><p>It really is a small-scale villa, from the open air patio to the easily accessible private beach area. This place is separate entirely from the more traditional hotel housing the rest of the staff and smaller actors; even Chaeyeon shares a hotel room with a makeup noona. Wonwoo really shouldn’t be surprised, seeing as Seungcheol and the other bigger-name actors are probably no more different than Mingyu.</p><p>“Nervous?” Wonwoo asks, setting down his bag and wiping at his lenses with the hem of his shirt. Something like a chill scuttles across his stomach. “It’s okay, you know. If you are.”</p><p>“It’s, uh, hard not to be. Would you be surprised if I said that I don’t have much experience in, in…”</p><p>“Kissing,” Wonwoo finishes for him. “Onscreen.” He puts his glasses back on and finds Mingyu glancing elsewhere.</p><p>“You could,” throat clear, “You could say that.”</p><p>Wonwoo sees this. He sees this and he hears this and the worst part opposite of his lizard brain flashes the words of a contract he signed and led to where he’s standing right now. His context for the space between himself and a surprise hoobae from his past extends beyond these luxurious walls and Wonwoo <em>still</em> walked here, he <em>still</em> responded to Chaeyeon’s texts and told her he could do this, no problem, when there are, in fact, several.</p><p>Mingyu lets his gaze wander back to Wonwoo, slow and then fast, like the southern pole of a magnet finding the northern pole of another.</p><p>They stay latched together. Just like that.</p><p>Wonwoo tears away to busy himself with his bag. “I know it’s something you’re not entirely comfortable with. Hopefully that’s alleviated somewhat by how much you’ve gotten to know your co-star. The big goal, I think, is to learn to control the reflexive embarrassment you’re likely to feel.” Wonwoo pulls out his note-taking tools and walks towards the patio. “Let’s practice outside. The open air will help with clearing your mind.”</p><p>No arguments except for what sounds like a deep inhale. Mingyu follows.</p><p>“Has the choreography of it been discussed?” asks Wonwoo, conversational. “The length and feeling?”</p><p>“Ah, yes. The director wants it to be, um, wants the lips to touch. No smoke and mirrors or anything. Sweet, short, maybe more than one if it feels right. Jaesang and Chunghee will be sitting on Jaesang’s jacket in the sand, near the water. Chunghee will be the one initiating, whatever is natural to do so in the moment.”</p><p>“Good call, letting the co-star with more experience lead. Seungcheol might ask you to practice a few times before anything’s recorded to get you both used to it.”</p><p>“Right. We have a few…meetings for that.”</p><p>Wonwoo nods again. He adjusts his glasses, takes a seat on one of the stiff wicker couches. From here, the sea salt smell is sharp but distant, like a faint reminder of a recent time he was forced into it more fully. Well, “forced” might not be the right word.</p><p>“Have you talked about character intentions with him yet?”</p><p>“Intentions?”</p><p>“Yes, intentions,” says Wonwoo, eyeing Mingyu taking the seat across him. “Just like a fight scene or any dramatic confrontation, both characters will come into this kiss with a reason for doing it.”</p><p>“They, er, like each other? <em>Aaand</em> by that expression, I’m guessing that’s not enough.”</p><p>Wonwoo almost chuckles at the innocence of the phrasing, but actually laughing probably won’t ease the bundled nerves in front of him.</p><p>“Kisses in showbiz are usually accessories at best, so you’re not wrong for thinking that. But you’re also correct to suggest that this story lends itself to something more authentic. It might be strange to think about the ‘why’ behind a kiss scene, but having that anchor could help with the shyness.”</p><p>Seeing Mingyu’s eyebrows pinch in a way that gives away little, Wonwoo adds:</p><p>“Okay, well, how about this. Why does Jaesang feel so much, for Chunghee?”</p><p>Perhaps, unintentionally, more than one question was asked of Mingyu then.</p><p>“I think Jaesang,” says Mingyu, “I think he started liking Chunghee for his passion.”</p><p>“Expound on that.”</p><p>“Even though Jaesang had the characteristics ideal for his role, he didn’t know he could love it the way Chunghee did.”</p><p>Wonwoo straightens himself out like unrolled parchment paper, almost like a premonition for the hand-lettered honesty Mingyu looks prepared to spell out. Wonwoo isn’t so daft as to ignore that. Somewhere in Mingyu’s limited experience, Wonwoo might be sitting at the forefront of those fingertips.</p><p>Mingyu continues: “It was a simple awe at first, probably, which is natural to feel when you see someone in their element. Maybe Jaesang hoped he could be that good and admired, too, after being in the sidelines for so long. But then to see Chunghee not only in his element, but also so clearly full of love for what he does and the people around him, I guess that’s where awe turned into something more…serious.”</p><p>“Define ‘serious.’”</p><p>“An, an unbridled desire to want to be near them, and to talk to them. It’s hard to explain in words.”</p><p>“Jaesang wasn’t even in the same room as Chunghee until much later.”</p><p>“That’s right,” Mingyu says softly. “The patience was worth it.”</p><p>A pain blossoms at the center of Wonwoo’s chest. He is reminded of the presence of nerves in his bones. He is reminded of a soreness that can only be described as longing with how deep is must be to reach such strong yet fragile bodily things.</p><p>It’s a rare thing to be looked at in this way—like <em>he</em> is something or someone to strive for. Wonwoo knows that look because he’s worn it before. Many times. And what an awful, beautiful feeling it is to be on the other side.</p><p>“How does Chunghee feel about Jaesang?” asks Mingyu.</p><p>“You already know that.”</p><p>“But I want to know what <em>you</em> think. That’s why I ask.”</p><p>Mingyu is bearing down on Wonwoo with a look both stubborn and at the cusp of fleeing at any moment. His words make Wonwoo’s face twist like a towel being wrung, but then it slowly unfurls as he realizes that Mingyu is putting forth more than one curiosity, too.</p><p>“I think,” says Wonwoo, “I think Chunghee is conflicted between responsibility and, as you’ve identified, passion. Love. They’re all so closely related in his mind that being faced with his…interest in Jaesang presents a deeply internal struggle that he doesn’t think Jaesang understands.”</p><p>“But Jaesang does, it’s just that—“</p><p>“It’s just that he and Chunghee are on opposite sides of the same fence,” Wonwoo interjects. “I misspoke earlier. And, well, as for intentions, I think Chunghee is, he is…“</p><p>If Wonwoo’s fingernails are biting into the skin of his own forearm, Mingyu’s teeth are digging into his bottom lip.</p><p>“He’s feels the same. As Jaesang.”</p><p>Someone makes a sharp inhale sound and Wonwoo is pretty sure it’s not himself.</p><p>“The depth of it isn’t as evident, I think, in the script. But Chunghee wavered a lot over his future when reality hit,” says Wonwoo, leaning back into the couch to stare at the palm thatch roof. “It hurt to be on the periphery of what he really wanted to do at first, but then he met Jaesang, who admired him so much. Maybe like a fan initially, but then as a person. And Chunghee was jealous at first, of course, seeing someone so naive be so successful in a position he dreamed of himself. But Jaesang gave Chunghee purpose. He helped Chungee realize that maybe he could still be fulfilled and...and <em>happy</em>. At that point of his life.”</p><p>Wonwoo has so many other things to add—how fun Jaesang was, how intoxicatingly sweet and kind and yet playful he can be, how Chunghee’s eyes would end up finding Jaesang even on opposite sides of the room in the hope of finding attention there—but he’d end up rambling about things not exactly on the script.</p><p>Thankfully, Mingyu keeps silent. With the distant ocean waves even louder by comparison, Wonwoo wonders dumbly if Mingyu is breathing at all.</p><p>Wonwoo ends up asking anyway: “Are you breathing?”</p><p>“I am.”</p><p>“Did any of that make sense?”</p><p>“I, uh, yes.”</p><p>The chuckle leaves Wonwoo before he can help it.</p><p>“Your eloquence is as impressive as always,” he quips, sitting up properly and finding Mingyu desperately keeping himself from turning into a ball. “I’m guessing the jitters are still there.”</p><p>“How can you tell? The definitely-not-<em>not</em>-breathing? Or the furnace about to explode from under my face? I’m actually very aware of it, saying that out loud. It’s very embarrassing.”</p><p>“Should I make it more embarrassing now so it’ll be less embarrassing later?”</p><p>“I don’t think you can do that—”</p><p>Mingyu’s words halt at the cushioned dip of Wonwoo now sitting next to him.</p><p>Faraway, the ocean water sounds unhurried. Air is as clean as it can get, here. Maybe it’s the difference between urban smog and a proper coastline that makes Wonwoo’s blood pump so fast, more determined to take in as much good oxygen before the city inevitably dirties his lungs again.</p><p>He can see Mingyu grab onto his own shorts, release, rub his palms on the now crumpled fabric.</p><p>When Mingyu opens his hands, Wonwoo recognizes the silent request to take them. So he does. Mingyu sighs through his nose.</p><p>“Do I,” he says, mouth dry, “Do I need to say a few lines beforehand? As a lead-in?”</p><p>“Only if you need to.”</p><p>A moment, then: “I don’t.”</p><p>Mingyu squeezes Wonwoo’s wrists when Wonwoo kisses him.</p><p>Something in Wonwoo’s chest is skewered entirely with the softness of the sensation. The hesitation of the eagerness. The push against the pull. This doesn’t feel like Mingyu’s first kiss by any means, but the goosebumps on his skin and the unsteady rise of his chest could convince anyone otherwise. It’s devastating, like a secret, a precious thing to hold. Wonwoo wants to swallow it all for himself.</p><p>One kiss turns into two, three, each sweeter than the one prior. Wonwoo can smell the free hotel body wash on Mingyu, taste the waxy balm Mingyu is definitely a sponsor of on his lips; Wonwoo wonders if that was all in preparation for this moment. He would laugh again if he could—and he sort of does in a sound muffled by the unmistakable shape of a smile against him. Wonwoo would find it very cute if not for the burning furnace-heat in Mingyu migrating quickly, from where his hands are tugging tugging <em>tugging</em> at Wonwoo like he isn’t close enough.</p><p>With a low noise, Wonwoo pulls away.</p><p><em>It must be the lip balm</em>, he thinks at the impossibly wet and red shine of Mingyu’s mouth.</p><p>“Please tell me this isn’t about the film any more,” Mingyu murmurs. Pleads, perhaps.</p><p>Which he doesn’t have to do, really, not with the way Wonwoo is already falling to the gravity of those lush cherry lips.</p><p>“It hasn’t been,” says Wonwoo. “Not for a while.”</p><p>“Oh. Well. Thank god for that.”</p><p>The same smile presses against Wonwoo once more. It’s the kind he can imagine like a dusted old photograph that is remarkably difficult to not return to over and over again.</p><p>Undoing his hands, Wonwoo trails his fingers from Mingyu’s forearms to his biceps to his shoulders and the warm, warm skin of his neck. With the multitude of physical landmarks to be fixated on with Kim Mingyu, the thought to kiss that neck has crossed Wonwoo’s mind more than once. But the urge waits in lieu of letting Mingyu cling to Wonwoo’s waist because it turns out that Prince Charming is strong enough to pull Wonwoo entirely onto his thighs.</p><p>Wonwoo does everything he can to keep a dangerous sound from leaving his throat. In this position, he can feel the heaps of quiet muscle beneath the cloth. There’s so much. So much of it. He is nearly dizzy with both imagination and memory.</p><p>And then something like a growl erupts, and not at all the kind Wonwoo was imagining.</p><p>Through shallow breaths, he says, “You haven’t eaten yet.”</p><p>If Mingyu looked embarrassed before, he is absolutely mortified when he hides his face in Wonwoo’s chest.</p><p>“I was just anxious,” he mumbles. The arms around Wonwoo’s waist tighten. “Better an empty stomach than the chance of throwing up on you. Then again, this also feels like the worst thing that could’ve possibly happened.”</p><p>“You could just tell me to get off of you nicely.”</p><p>“Not<em> that</em>, I like this, a lot, I meant—you know what I mean!”</p><p>Wonwoo feels like he might split in half with how many feelings in his body are going to burst out. A very specific, affectionate swear almost tumbles out of him. God, this dolt is an absolute <em>rollercoaster </em>and Wonwoo can’t find any other way he’d want it.</p><p>Pulling on Mingyu’s face comes with little resistance. Wonwoo gently bites at Mingyu’s bottom lip, pulls back enough to watch Mingyu chase the reward before releasing with a curl to his grin.</p><p>The narrow of Mingyu’s eyes almost makes Wonwoo shiver.</p><p>But, mind and body recollected, Wonwoo declares, “I think I owe you a dinner date.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>By “dinner date” Wonwoo really means room service at Mingyu’s mini villa, but at least he doesn’t have to worry about breaking into hives from a fish market trip he couldn’t reject if asked face-to-face. Which Mingyu would have done eventually.</p><p>“Are you saying I could have <em>killed you</em> on our first date?” Mingyu asks, aghast.</p><p>Wonwoo snorts through his food. “How cute, you were planning a date all along.”</p><p>He does his best to mitigate Mingyu’s ensuing panic over his unrealized plans to woo Wonwoo once and for all. Probably not the safest idea to execute in public spaces. But to Mingyu’s credit, it’s not like there are many nosy cameras around the fish market besides those from local ahjummas and ahjusshis. Unsurprisingly, Kim Mingyu has snuck firmly into that demographic as well.</p><p>Wonwoo doesn’t mind. He rather enjoys the intimacy of clinking wine glasses with Mingyu here, nibbling through fancy gujeolpan and mini desserts delivered from the hotel’s fine dining restaurant.</p><p>Under the table, he taps Mingyu’s shin with his foot. Nothing suggestive. Simply for attention.</p><p>“You wouldn’t have done anything I wouldn’t allow myself to do,” reassures Wonwoo, “If my predilection for control is any indication.”</p><p>“I guess you’re right,” Mingyu says with a sip of his cabernet. “I’m sorry for underestimating you, hyung.”</p><p>“I didn’t see it that way. In fact, I’m more surprised you haven’t complained much about my micromanaging.”</p><p>“Would it surprise you to say that I’m used to that sort of thing?”</p><p>“The difference is that you should <em>like</em> it.”</p><p>Wonwoo doesn’t realize the invitation he’d dispensed until a foot nudges at his own leg, supposedly for attention as well.</p><p>He raises his eyebrows. “You skip eating because you’re nervous, freak out over ruined first date plans, get shy and embarrassed at the flip of the switch, and then you pull shit like <em>this</em>. Are you sure you need an acting coach?”</p><p>“A lot of it is for show. Out of habit,” admits Mingyu. His foot drops down again and he looks askance. “Does it, does it bother you? I know it can be annoying to switch things around a lot. I still haven’t really found an image that fits me yet despite being as old as I am—”</p><p>“I like that about you,” says Wonwoo, cheek against his knuckle. The wine might be showing on his lips. “You’re constantly adapting to different circumstances, which makes sense, given your career timeline. Keeps people on their toes. It’s exciting.”</p><p>“That’s. Erm. I am?”</p><p>“I described you as a rollercoaster in my head. On more than one occasion, probably.”</p><p>“And that’s a…good thing.”</p><p>“Rollercoasters are fun.”</p><p>Mingyu laughs in a way so blisteringly honest and light, he sounds like a soft wax candle glowing in the midst of a romantic dinner. Which this might be. Wonwoo’s fingers tighten around his wine glass.</p><p>“You’re always such a fun hyung to talk to,” Mingyu says, cheeks almost completely pressed into his eyes and canines in full, gleaming view.“You sure know the most interesting things to say to me at the most interesting times.”</p><p>It’s easy to bristle at that tone, the kind that is a little too sharp to remain entirely polite. But something about the words Mingyu has chosen, clearly deliberately, that burrows into Wonwoo’s nerves. The feeling is so heated yet innocent, overwhelming but still pleasant.</p><p>It’s—it’s <em>gratitude</em>, is what this is. In a life so ruled by predictability and ensuring it, perhaps the most predictable thing was Wonwoo feeling this way when presented with someone like Mingyu.</p><p>“Was I the sunbae?” asks Wonwoo, swirling a single gulp’s worth of wine. “The one you were talking about. Before, when we were doing scene twelve at your company.”</p><p>Mingyu’s laughing stops abruptly, as if someone pressed the mute button on him and he realized it.</p><p>“So you do remember,” he says.</p><p>“Kudos to you for keeping up appearances so well. I actually believed that you barely knew me.” Wonwoo takes that gulp of tart, sharp drink. “I finally watched <em>Miracles</em> long enough to see the credits. So yes, I do remember, though honestly not too much.”</p><p>“Ah, well, there isn’t much to remember.”</p><p>“I beg to differ. I wonder if I still have that old handkerchief lying around.”</p><p>Mingyu groans into his hands. “God, that’s so <em>embarrassing</em>. I was such a dweeb back then, I could barely process that <em>you</em> of all people walked in on me changing and then you brought <em>food</em> with you, too, that you bought with your own money. And I was crying! <em>Crying! </em>You were probably thinking, ‘Who’s this uncool goober, using the room all for himself?’ And you still went and said nice things to me anyway. I didn’t stop thinking about that for days, you know, and—oh. Shit. Wait. You didn’t, like, like, pity-kiss me earlier, did you? Because I’d understand if that was the case, granted I’ll be pretty sad considering how long I’ve been thinking about—”</p><p>Now it’s Wonwoo’s turn to laugh, even though he knows full well that laughing at Mingyu’s concerns isn’t exactly the best response. But the absolutely <em>amazing</em> consideration that Jeon Wonwoo, of all people, would kiss another human being—let alone get swept into straddling them like a chair—all because of a wistful nostalgia boner is far too hilarious not to laugh at.</p><p>Wonwoo scrubs at his eyes with his palms. Is he delirious again? Must be the alcohol. Mingyu definitely ordered the good stuff and Wonwoo’s tolerance recently has left much to be desired.</p><p>He huffs out, “To think that you talked too little then and you talk too much now. Your unpredictability really is astounding sometimes.”</p><p>“You like it, though.”</p><p>The pride is faint, but there, in Mingyu’s voice. His sigh sounds sweet.</p><p>Wonwoo smiles a little. “I guess I do.”</p><p>“Man, to think that Jeon Wonwoo likes me, and that I’m acting for his first screenplay. What a rollercoaster <em>that </em>is. Me back then would never believe me now if I said that. He—I liked you then, too, you know. If that wasn’t evident.”</p><p>“It…wasn’t. How could you have liked someone you barely knew back then?”</p><p>Mingyu reaches for his hand. Wonwoo lets him do so, lets him slot their fingers together in a way that’s as warming as hours in the sun or a drink or two in the system.</p><p>“There’s a lot of honesty in the way you act,” says Mingyu. “I was really inspired by it.”</p><p>Chaeyeon once said that Mingyu is good at being honest. Wonder where that came from.</p><p>And now Mingyu starts <em>giggling</em> to himself, like he’d caught the delirium Wonwoo must be running hot with. What a crazy, charming guy, this Kim Mingyu. Maybe those half-baked nicknames for him by netizens weren’t entirely inaccurate.</p><p>Prince Charming himself kisses Wonwoo’s knuckles, even smiles into the motion. Wonwoo’s chest aches at what he realizes is fantasy for most, yet somehow reality for him.</p><p>“Hm, Jeon Wonwoo am I?” he hums. “Dropping the ‘hyung’ and ‘sunbae’ again, and so soon, huh? Am I that easy to you?”</p><p>Mingyu startles with eyes blown wide. “O-Of course not! The last few months, <em>years</em> even, have been anything but easy! Ah, well, not to say that you’re difficult<em>—</em>”</p><p>“And somehow you have all this courage to drag me onto your lap at your private villa. Gosh, how could a lowly writer like me say no to such a big celebrity name?”</p><p>“Wait, what, oh no, don’t you pull the acting card on me!”</p><p>“We were practicing for a <em>scene</em>, Mister Kim, and you just <em>pulled</em> me <em>in</em>—”</p><p>When Mingyu splutters out sounds in the most unattractive way possible, Wonwoo, awful and helpless, just laughs again.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Wen Junhui</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Hey Won, are you free tonight?</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I think I may need some company</em>
</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Me? Banking on the intimacy of (1) flashbacks and (2) lengthy, heartfelt conversation? Insanity. No one saw it coming. I might also have A Thing for WW sitting on people’s laps during make-out sessions...</p><p>Thank you so much for reading! I'd love to know what you thought!</p><p> </p><p>  <a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com">tumblr</a></p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>“Jun, what’s the—<em>mmph!”</em></p><p>Wonwoo should have seen this coming, and yet, for all his people-reading is worth, he didn’t. Chalk it up to a unique kind of self-centeredness only writers seem to know.</p><p>Wonwoo has barely a foot around the turn of the hallway by the time Jun is already licking into his mouth, the taste of beer grainy and bitter against the sour-sweet of the dessert wine Wonwoo ordered last-minute at Mingyu’s villa. Something is off about Jun, from the borderline-painful grip of his hands around Wonwoo’s forearms to sharper biting at Wonwoo’s lips. A groan nearly escapes them, with the wine haze not fully dissipated yet.</p><p>It has dissipated enough, however, for Wonwoo to pull away.</p><p>“Jun,” he hisses, gaze darting to the peripheries. Still empty. “What has gotten into you? Are you drunk?”</p><p>The grin that meets Wonwoo is crooked. “What are you talking about? I’m always like this. I’m the horny asshole between the two of us, aren’t I?”</p><p>Wonwoo’s brows pinch. “The hell? What’s that supposed to mean? I mean, I do, <em>did</em> call you that, but it was only ribbing, I swear—”</p><p>Jun’s eye glints like a red light before he swoops in to scrape his teeth at Wonwoo’s jaw, a place they both know full well has been restricted from any form of marking. This time, Wonwoo actually shoves him off.</p><p>“Wen Junhui,” Wonwoo starts, huffing and firm. Something is wrong. “Did I do something? Was it me? Is this because of all the shitty things I’ve said to you and it’s only now you’re realizing that, yeah, you’re a horny asshole but I’m, like, the true asshole? Fuck, I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’m saying. Just tell me what’s wrong so I can fix it.”</p><p>The saucer-level widening of Jun’s eyes would be comical if not for the dread still circulating in Wonwoo’s blood. He has rarely, if ever, seen Jun like this.</p><p>Jun makes a sound of disbelief. “‘True asshole’? What is this, the asshole alignment chart?”</p><p>“I’m ninety-nine percent sure that exists.”</p><p>“You definitely drank tonight.”</p><p>“So did you, more than me by the looks of it.”</p><p>Junhui’s laugh is vacant when his forehead drops onto Wonwoo’s shoulder.</p><p>Wonwoo cups his hand to Jun’s neck. Squeezes gently. “Another rejection, huh?”</p><p>Jun holds onto Wonwoo’s waist. “Yeah.”</p><p>“Sounds bad. Do you want to talk about it?”</p><p>“Not really. At least, not now.”</p><p>“Alright.”</p><p>Wonwoo can feel Jun’s fingers dig into the old dents of his cotton shirt. That much, Wonwoo anticipated.</p><p>“Can we?” asks Jun, pleading through his eyelashes in a way that any iron-willed person would be challenged to turn down. “I need to get my mind off things, and…and…you’re here.”</p><p><em>Am I?</em> Wonwoo almost says, but that wouldn’t have made sense.</p><p>It’s important to underline the fact that Jun is a pretty damn resilient person, given his job and visa, as is Wonwoo with how little of a choice he has with his work. But they’re only human at the end of the day. It’s never easy to admit. And the rarity of seeing Jun like this, and the pierce of pain through Wonwoo at witnessing it, is a testament to exactly that.</p><p>He looks at Jun. Jun doesn’t look back at him. Wonwoo takes that sad, damn handsome face into his hands and shakes it a little.</p><p>“I made a promise to you,” he says softly, “I promised you that we wouldn’t do this again.”</p><p>Jun turns his face into one palm. Leans into it. Between the two of them, he has always been so much more drawn to the physical connection. Always thinking more with his body than his words—well, perhaps it’s no surprise that the two of them found each other and ended up like this.</p><p>Lips are pressed to Wonwoo’s palm. Once, twice.</p><p>“For fun,” Jun remembers.</p><p>“For fun,” Wonwoo echoes.</p><p>Jun sleeps over that night, as he wants. Needs, maybe. With all Jun has done, it’s the least Wonwoo feels he can do.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Turns out that Jun’s rejection was for a Chinese-Korean drama—and by “Chinese-Korean drama” the producers really meant a C-drama by linguistic definitions, but with a shit ton of Korean celebrities dubbed over in post. Go figure. Bohyuk often complains to Wonwoo about American media’s atrociously slim representation for Asians, but it turns out that that “All Asians Look the Same” sentiment has carryover in this hemisphere as well.</p><p>“Hallyu Wave, my ass,” Jun grumbles under the blankets next to Wonwoo. “People like me work our asses off in fancy academies and traditional dance and cultural instruments and the <em>one thing</em> we can’t change is what fucks us over. Here? Fine, I get it. But back home, too? I can’t win anywhere.”</p><p>Wonwoo remains silent, instead leaning against the bed’s headboard as his phone is beaming with today’s slew of entertainment news.</p><p>“Won?”</p><p>None of the headlines seem to register, blurry and out of focus.</p><p>“Jeon Wonwoo.”</p><p>The full name seems to blink Wonwoo back. The top layer of his corneas must be burned out by now, with how blinding the light of his phone is compared to the dim space around them. Even Jun is squinting, looking up at Wonwoo with his twisted features more angular from the glow.</p><p>Wonwoo clicks off his phone, sets it on the side table. “Sorry. I guess I’m more spaced out than usual,” he says. The place behind his eyes is sore. “It’s been…it’s been a bit of a day. For me.”</p><p>“That bad with the star pupil?”</p><p>“Depends,” says Wonwoo, eyes wandering to a very distant point. “Depends on what you mean by ‘bad.’”</p><p>“Sounds like a good bad.”</p><p>“What a strange string of words.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s eyes haven’t fully adjusted to the darkness yet, so he can’t see how Jun shifts himself between the starchy bed linens. But Wonwoo can hear it, can feel beneath unmoving fingers Jun twist his head to face the ceiling. A silence slithers into the bed, and breaths sound like midnight traffic.</p><p>Wonwoo becomes so focused on his own chest that he doesn’t realize Jun’s hand tangling with his until Wonwoo almost jolts from it. So telling is the act that, as the silence rings longer, even Wonwoo finds it unbearable enough to speak first.</p><p>“I’m sorry. I probably have been, for a while.”</p><p>“For what?”</p><p>“For, you know. This. I don’t think…I haven’t made things easy, for either of us. I should’ve told you sorry sooner.”</p><p>It’s easy to imagine both the stone coldness and silent laughter on Wen Junhui’s face.</p><p>“You apologize like you have the world on your shoulders, Jeon Wonwoo.” Jun sounds exasperated. “What could you possibly be imagining, saying that? Let me guess: you’re sorry because you think you’ve forced this. Us. Because somehow all the positive and negative consequences in the universe revolve around you.”</p><p>When Jun sits up and swivels over the other side of the bed, over its edge, to grab his jacket from the floor and fix himself back up, Wonwoo is nearly of the mind to grab the back of Jun’s shirt and yank him down<em>. </em>Wonwoo wants to say: <em>What the fuck, asshole? You think that </em>I<em> have that big of an ego? Is that how you respond to an apology?</em></p><p>Something in Wonwoo is desperate for Jun to dare say those words to again, with the room lights on and really face-to-face, as if he wasn’t the one who was about to bite Wonwoo’s tongue off outside this hotel room knowing full well where they are. Who else is here. At least then, with a real fight, they’d have a better reason to break apart.</p><p>“You can only micromanage so much,” Jun says with an irritatingly neutral tone. “Yes, actions have consequences. Yes, no one lives in a vacuum. But you’d be overconfident to think you can just write out every little thing in your head and then convince yourself that <em>that</em> must be the truth you see.”</p><p>“What the hell? Where is any of that even coming from?” Wonwoo snaps. “I just wanted to give you a god damn apology for making you go in circles—”</p><p>“There. <em>That,”</em> Jun interjects sharply. Jesus, Wonwoo has never heard him speak like this before. “I can take the smartassery, the prickliness, the frankly unhealthy obsession you have with making this bucket list checkbox of yours the perfectest perfect that was ever perfected. Sometimes all those things might even be endearing. But even <em>I</em> can’t stand it when you talk like you—like you have some kind of <em>protagonist complex</em>. That’s what really ticks me off.”</p><p>Wonwoo goes slack-jawed. “Pro…protagonist complex? What the hell are you on about?”</p><p>Jun doesn’t elaborate with a tight-lipped look that suggests he could if he wanted to.</p><p>Wonwoo imagines sharp cheekbone against knuckles, zipped mouth forced open to speak so he doesn’t have to find out the answer by himself, in himself. It takes a long moment for Wonwoo to confront the searing red anger filling him, deconstruct it piece by piece, before letting it dissolve back into the stomach acid kind enough to not devour him inside out.</p><p>“Did you think you were taking advantage of me? All those times we fucked?” says Junhui, so direct yet soft that Wonwoo almost pleads, <em>Don’t talk to me like that. I can’t stand it.</em> “Did you think that I was such a generous, unconditionally giving person to let you use me? We <em>all</em> act in self-interest, Wonwoo. I’ve taken from you as much as you’ve taken from me. Whatever you’ve constructed of me in your head, that’s not who I am.”</p><p>
  <em>The one thing we can’t change is what fucks us over.</em>
</p><p>“You’re not proud of what you’ve done? Well,” Jun exhales slowly, “neither am I.”</p><p>Wonwoo just stares back, mouth still agape.</p><p>“I don’t know if I’m making sense anymore. I’ve definitely used the wrong words or something at some point,” says Jun with a tight chuckle. “And I still think well of you. I do.”</p><p>“...Why?”</p><p>“We understood each other. I felt like someone you trusted enough to see you behind the barriers. I felt wanted for something, an important role, maybe.”</p><p>Jun says this, but the effervescent ego he’s often painted with has long since faded. For a stretched moment, Wonwoo doesn’t have anything to retort with. He’s mostly astounded at how much Jun had to say, as if he’d wanted to say these things for a long time.</p><p>“Honestly, I don’t know how to respond.”</p><p>“Oh? Did I finally make Jeon Wonwoo speechless?”</p><p>Wonwoo falls back onto the bed, huffing, granting exactly that consolation prize.</p><p>Jun laughs, however hoarse it may sound. Chunks of hair stick out. Rumpled clothes still fit well on his broad frame. This is a lion of a person, when he wants to be.</p><p>Wonwoo closes his eyes. “Consider me intimidated. I don’t know if I should say sorry or not again.”</p><p>“Please don’t be. I’m sorry, too. That was, erm, that was a pretty rude outburst. Really seemed like it all came out of nowhere, didn’t it?”</p><p>There is a brief flash of memory, of Wonwoo doing something very similar once upon a time to an unseeming actor, dead highlighter in hand. Words like that always come from somewhere.</p><p>“I just,” continues Jun, “I don’t want you to keep being burdened by feeling like you have to orchestrate the best outcome, acting everyone out in your head—and don’t say it’s all for you, because I know that you’re a people pleaser deep down, as much as you hate being called that. And I...I still love you, despite everything.”</p><p>Self-centered for the sake of others. Another strange set of words.</p><p>Wonwoo tries not to imagine himself and Jun in poorly fitting off-the-rack suits, at the bar of a mid-tier hotel while trading whiskey glasses before the whiskey convinced them to go home together. Even with the image reel in the periphery—because he can’t help but think it up after hearing Jun nod and laugh like that, with decision—there is a pain.</p><p>It’s a familiar pain, one he doesn’t realize <em>is</em> familiar until Jun’s back disappears on the other side of the hotel room door, without so much as a good night.</p><p>They’ll still see each other tomorrow. Wonwoo doesn’t anticipate their friendship ending, either, if Jun’s<em> I still love you, despite everything</em> meant anything. Which it does.</p><p>But Wonwoo would be lying if he said his hotel room didn’t feel twice as empty now. It's far too spacious for the one person left inside it.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>At the last breakfast buffet, Chaeyeon offers him a carpool. Wonwoo almost spits his pineapple juice.</p><p>Sitting in a small, confined van space for several consecutive hours with at least half a dozen other people—one of whom Wonwoo locked lips with the night before—is the last thing he wants. So he politely declines and takes the staff bus back to Seoul proper instead. Less likely for anyone to gawk at his drooling face when he inevitably falls asleep in his seat.</p><p>More than the suffocating air, Wonwoo can’t exactly face Mingyu right now. Not after what happened with Jun and the cascade of spiraling thoughts that followed it.</p><p>
  <em>Please take good care of me. You have before.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I really liked this sunbae. Watching them really changed me.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>The patience was worth it.</em>
</p><p>These sentiments and the soft, awe-struck voice behind them replay in Wonwoo’s mind like a broken record. What once felt like light blooming in the center his chest is growing into a black hole. Matter is no more; an emptiness, an awareness of something “less than” or “vacant” sits beside Wonwoo’s lungs and threatens to siphon whatever fresh ocean air he naively hoped to keep.</p><p>Of the millions of people in this country, Jeon Wonwoo has been the model for Mingyu’s new career goals. Jeon Wonwoo is the coach, the sunbae, the <em>hyung</em> Mingyu can depend on. Jeon Wonwoo has been the singular target of Mingyu’s warm and affectionate gaze long before he became the next novice darling of acting world—</p><p>And Wonwoo is afraid, frankly. Afraid of believing in such simply-said sentiments. More than that, he’s already wracked with the shame of never living up to them. Last night was a testament to that.</p><p>God, imagine pouring so much love into someone for so long, only to be disappointed by them in the end. Wonwoo can’t do that to someone who deserves better.</p><p>Wait. Shit. Wonwoo is thinking of himself when he’s thinking about other people, being self-centered when he’s trying to be anything but. That’s all he ever does, doesn’t it? Twist himself in these contradictory knots and now he can’t stop tightening them when he desperately wants to escape—and he’s being so god damn self-conscious about it, too. As if his brain wasn’t a fucking pile of ants already.</p><p>Maybe Wonwoo <em>has</em> gone soft. Maybe his professionalism <em>has</em> long since left him for someone more capable of practicing it. Without that viciously logical part of himself to cling onto, every other part of his imperfect, maze-like brain starts to drown itself out until his deficiencies consume him in the end.</p><p>No, he can’t possibly see Mingyu like this, not when Wonwoo knows he’ll have to confront that smile again. He wouldn’t be able to bear it.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Hey, wasn’t sure if your company contacted you about a meeting? Might have to do with variety for the fall season.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Mingyu insists on treating you, so let me know what you want to drink. (I don’t trust his instincts about your tastes just yet.)</em>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>Spontaneous combustion is a thing, right? So what about skin just…melting off? Suddenly? Without any real medical explanation for it? Because Wonwoo wishes that all of the above and more would happen at any moment while sitting in this conference room.</p><p>Granted, a spacious conference room is far more bearable than a private van, and being several chairs away from Mingyu alongside a basic iced coffee in hand gives Wonwoo an inkling of comfort. Still desperately wants to escape, though.</p><p>Especially since this place is occupied by a mere handful of people—two of whom are from the PR departments of either company involved.</p><p>Chaeyeon flinches when Wonwoo looks at her. <em>I’m sorry, I had no idea</em>, she mouths. He tries to believe her.</p><p>“I’m just gonna cut to the chase,” says Lee Chan, based on his work name tag. Sitting beside Mingyu, he gently pushes a tablet across the table. “We’ve received some potentially unpleasant news in the last week or so about yourself, Mister Jeon, and Mingyu here.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s eyes dart to him immediately. “Unpleasant,” he echoes.</p><p>Suddenly, the air grows ten times heavier and everyone in the room seems to have trouble settling their eyes on one place. Chan immediately stutters over what he’s going to say next.</p><p>“I, well, I’m not saying <em>you’re </em>unpleasant or anything, Mister Jeon, but—”</p><p>“This isn’t exactly cutting to the chase, either.”</p><p>“I would if you’d let me—”</p><p>“What Mister Jeon is probably trying to say is that more clarification would be greatly appreciated, so as to not have unnecessary misunderstandings,” interjects Seokmin, a PR representative from Wonwoo’s own company. His infallible smile is, in hindsight, a great accompaniment to Wonwoo’s deluge of poorly-manifesting anxiety. “Let’s take a careful look at this, shall we?”</p><p>Glancing up, Wonwoo finds Mingyu not meeting his gaze, if not actively avoiding it. A stark contrast from the eager texts. He must have been informed already, right before this, from a manager who has the courtesy of knowing what the hell is going on.</p><p>Seokmin takes the tablet offered. Little time is allowed before it's unlocked.</p><p>There on the fingerprint-dirty screen is a photo, grainy in its late hour, taken quickly on a phone based on the orientation and poor focus. Framed by palm trees and plants, distant lights and an unmistakable palm thatch roof, is documentation of one individual straddling another. Arms and legs are wrapped around willing bodies. Hands buried in hair. No matter how blurry and muddled the colors are, there are times when body language is simply unmistakable in its speakers’ intentions.</p><p>The photo shows no cameras or crew. Lodgings are clearly private. Very little can be argued for the workplace practicality of such...intimacy.</p><p>Seokmin flips through the rest. There are only a few. They all look very similar and clearly unprofessional, as if some middle schooler snuck in to use their smartphone camera for the first time. This is what Wonwoo thinks at least, to keep himself from completely chugging his iced coffee in a single, impressive, choking-hazard level gulp.</p><p>“Based on all the short, dark-haired people with pale skin whom you know of,” says Seokmin, slowly, “You’ve somehow gleaned that Mister Jeon was the one at Mister Kim’s villa that evening?”</p><p>“We assumed,” says Chan, “given what he’s told us—”</p><p>“You <em>told</em> them about what happened?”</p><p>Wonwoo’s disbelief cuts through the air. The flare in his cheeks feel wrong. Mingyu visibly shakes with his inhale.</p><p>He immediately insists, “I didn’t! I didn’t, hyung, I promise. A few people here know <em>about </em>you, but I’ve, I don’t, it’s just,” there’s another sharp breath to punctuate the silence following it. Mingyu’s use of it now, of all god damn times, drives Wonwoo to the razor edge of his wits.</p><p>“Look, it’s smart to point out the ambiguity of these photos,” reasons Chan, “You can’t immediately be implicated based on them, Mister Jeon, and this is a clear violation of privacy, both personal and of a privately-sanctioned area. Thusly, it warrants legal action on various fronts…”</p><p><em>That’s not the point,</em> Wonwoo wants to drag from the depths of his throat. <em>I’m not the one I’m concerned about.</em></p><p>Instead what he says is: “I can resign from the film.”</p><p>Chan’s one-sided talk stops abruptly at the same time Seokmin’s eyes widen and lock onto Wonwoo.</p><p>“Wonwoo—”</p><p>“Accurate claims will be impossible without a real connection,” Wonwoo continues precisely, “I'm also not saying that my involvement will be completely nullified; we still expect to be compensated in full. But my name and face are still documented online, however small. Removing them entirely from writing and consulting credits significantly undermines statements from greedy or malicious staff who may be in the know. There’s a high chance that the culprit is internal. Any other claims of identity will be objectively false."</p><p>Wonwoo chuckles humorlessly. “It doesn’t exactly help with with arguing against being pictured with <em>someone</em>, let alone another man. But the clothes look baggy enough to argue otherwise, perhaps. I guess this is karma for being an ass to some senior writers.”</p><p>Mingyu bursts from his seat, hands slammed onto the table as the metal feet of his chair screech across polished floor.</p><p>In a desperate high tone: <em>"Hyung!"</em> then softer, as if he’s really trying to sort his thoughts out, “Hyung, please, none of that is necessary. We’re still trying to gather details about the perpetrator and, and in any case, I heard about what you’d said to those writers. You were justified. I-It’s not just me saying that, either! The cast agreed, when we heard the younger writers talking about it. Besides, Chan was still discussing legal actions that our companies could collectively propose to discourage—”</p><p>“And that’s enough?”</p><p>Wonwoo slowly rises from his seat to meet Mingyu eye to eye. Something about Wonwoo’s face must contort because Mingyu’s expression twitches at the sight of it.</p><p>“There is a frighteningly thin gap between those photos and the entire <em>Internet</em>, Mingyu.” The words sound like they’re being pushed through Wonwoo’s teeth. “Misunderstanding or not, misplaced context or not, your career is still new and so damn fragile right now and could be—no, will <em>undoubtedly</em> be—ruined if any of this comes to light. How could I…how could I...”</p><p>A choked, airy sound splits Wonwoo’s tirade apart. No one is disagreeing with him because, of all the theories Wonwoo has seen as truths, this much is truthful enough.</p><p>“How could I possibly live with that?” says Wonwoo, voice breaking at the end, “How could I live with hurting you that badly, even just the <em>thought</em> it, and at such an amazing point in your life?”</p><p>Mingyu’s clenched heart is painted all over his face, fluctuating between twisted and lax and twisted once more. There’s a river in Wonwoo that wants to whisk it all away.</p><p>“Who says you’ve hurt me? That you’re going to hurt me?” Mingyu’s gentility is the worst part. “I don’t know if it helps at all, and it probably doesn’t, but there’s at least one person in this room who doesn’t think that.”</p><p>“Actions have consequences, Mingyu." Memories flood, from someone else broken off of Wonwoo’s chest. Like a fresh wound barely healed. "We don’t live in a vacuum.”</p><p>“I know! I mean, I’m sorry, I know,” murmurs Mingyu, again more softly the second time around. “But, but hyung.”</p><p><em>Don’t call me that,</em> Wonwoo wants to say. Beg. <em>Don’t say it like that. You’re going to tear me apart.</em></p><p>“Is this what you really want?” Mingyu’s voice is barely a whisper.</p><p>Wonwoo sits back down in his chair, crosses his arms and legs; there’s only so much weight those legs can carry. He isn’t even going to try and parse what Mingyu means by the question, not when simply looking at Mingyu forces gravel into Wonwoo’s veins.</p><p>“Taking control until the end.” The chuckle that comes out of Wonwoo burns like whiskey against a throat sore from yelling. “That’s something I’ve always wanted, isn’t it?”</p><p>A pause, and he hears Mingyu taking his seat.</p><p>The suffocating silence is held affixed to the air for a very long time, so much so that it seems to stretch on with every passing second. What a sight it must have been to the others here, seeing two supposed adults bickering over a shitty, grainy photo taken on some stranger’s phone. And yet no one can really oppose the disaster that could come of such a shitty, grainy thing.</p><p>Then, Seokmin speaks:</p><p>“We’ll be in discussion, Mister Lee Chan.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>With the final script edits gasping to their finish line alongside a summer-fall transition brimming with A-tier idol comebacks, Wonwoo finds himself dragged once more into the dark, aegyo-filled pits of variety show writing. There’s no more reason for him to attend filming.</p><p>All over again, he stands in the shadowed nook beside the filming stage. Entertains the same wandering thoughts about slouching, candy-haired kids with stunning muscle memory. Tripping over makeup noonas. The works. Not like there’s much incentive for Wonwoo to do anything else.</p><p>He still gets updates from Jun about the last few days of filming.</p><p>“So. Much. Champagne,” are his harrowing words. “You should’ve seen it, Won. Jeonghan practically stabbed the director’s face with a whole bottle and made him chug. Everyone was cheering, Jihoon was definitely drunk at the end of it, and I’m pretty sure he smacked faces with one of the supporting actresses. And she was giving him the eyes for <em>weeks!</em> It was mayhem in, like, the best and weirdest way possible. Oh, and if you’re wondering why Mingyu wasn’t there, he told me had some conflicting schedules. Bummer the guy’s gotten even busier.”</p><p>A laugh-shaken video accompanies the phone call posthaste. It sadly lacks visual evidence of a drunk Lee Jihoon—what an absolute gift that would’ve been—but the rest of that chaos is certainly a sight to see, even in Mingyu’s absence. There is no doubt that Mingyu would be there if he could, but it’s hard to justify even more potential proof for tarnishing that squeaky clean image. Par for the course, really.</p><p>“We missed you out there, you know,” Jun says. “You should’ve heard the set assistants. They were absolutely devastated that they couldn’t use the end of filming as an excuse to casually talk to you. Wait, shit, maybe you and I should’ve talked about this beforehand. It feels more appropriate for you to have been there, not me, if I’m the one who kept you from showing up in the first place and there’s even a dinner next week—”</p><p>Wonwoo snorts with his reply, “I’d be lying if I said you weren’t a contributing factor. But if it’s any consolation, I probably wouldn’t have gone anyway. There’s just a lot on my plate right now.”</p><p>“A lot on your plate or a lot on your mind?”</p><p>“They’re not mutually exclusive.”</p><p>“Right.” Static, then, “I shouldn’t be calling or texting you like this, should I?”</p><p>“Hm, perhaps. We weren’t very conventional to begin with.” Wonwoo glances at his watch and finds a time later than expected. He barely stops himself from swearing under his breath. “Sorry, but I have to go soon. I do think we should slow down on the communication, at least for a little while, so we can both focus on getting our shit together.”</p><p>Jun sounds like he’s scratching his temple. “You’re probably right. We’ll find something that works for both of us again. Maybe.”</p><p>“Maybe. And hey.”</p><p>“Yeah?”</p><p>“I do appreciate the updates. Thank you.”</p><p>If Wonwoo accidentally implies that he isn’t getting these so-called updates otherwise, Jun doesn’t mention it.</p><p>They both offer their short good-byes. Wonwoo skims through the slew of KakaoTalk messages from the film’s production assistant about story beats for the editing team, maybe even take part in finalizing the music editing with Jihoon if schedules allow; guess the resignation news is still being finalized.</p><p>Jeon Wonwoo at the start of this mayhem, with his never-dead fake plants and dusty diploma and plain apartment, would <em>drool</em> at this wealth of access and sway.</p><p>Jeon Wonwoo now? Well, he supposes he’ll think of something to reply with later. It’s been an endeavor and a half to write anything these days.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>
  <b>From: Jung Chaeyeon</b>
</p><p>
  <em>Hey, let’s get a drink together. On me.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Unless you’re actually at work or actually dying, I’m not taking no for an answer.</em>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>“This is about your kid.”</p><p>“Mingyu and I are literally the same age,” says Chaeyeon, “But yes. I am talking about the person I am legally contracted to look after.”</p><p>Recent chaos in Wonwoo’s life hasn’t rendered him entirely ignorant, so it isn’t difficult to guess her intentions for wanting to meet him. The puzzle is why she would act on them in the first place.</p><p>“You’re not stupid <em>and</em> you’re his manager,” Wonwoo says, watching the ice of his Moscow mule bob up and down when the bartender sets it in front of him. “You know letting him anywhere near me is a terrible idea on several fronts. Yet, you still want to convince me otherwise.”</p><p>“I mean well when I say you’re much more bullheaded than your face suggests, so no, I’m not here to make a changed man out of you.” Chaeyeon flicks a piece of glitter from her hand. A relic of another photoshoot to bolster good image, no doubt. “More than a manager, I’m here as a messenger.”</p><p>“That’s definitely outside your pay grade.”</p><p>“Yah, are you talking like a cold asshole on purpose?”</p><p>“Ever heard of acting?”</p><p>“Shut <em>up.”</em></p><p>Wonwoo can’t help but smile when Chaeyeon physically stands at her bar stool with a threatening fist. She’s laughing. He doesn’t doubt for a moment that she could be a blackbelt in something and is just being nice about it.</p><p>Chaeyeon drops into her seat again with a huff. “More than a manager, and even more than a messenger, I’m here to talk as a friend.”</p><p>“Mingyu sure is lucky to have a manager who thinks of him that way.”</p><p>“Well, we’re the same age, so it’s bound to be like that,” she says. “But I’d like to think I see you as a friend as well.”</p><p>When Wonwoo grabs his drink, the glass feels wet and cold, like an ice pack against a bruise. He takes a big, big gulp. Tipping her daiquiri at Wonwoo, Chaeyeon takes her own swig.</p><p>“Out of all the insipid, unsuccessful professional ventures in my life,” says Chaeyeon, “The trajectory of Mingyu’s career has been one of the most stressful and rewarding things I’ve ever had a hand in. Call it what you will, perhaps even riding on the coattails of a man. A classic, that one. But I can’t not acknowledge how much Mingyu has helped me. I’ve never seen a big male celebrity—soloists especially—argue for keeping their female managers, let alone make them a head manager.”</p><p>“Didn’t some other bandmates go solo as well?”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“I see.”</p><p>“As for you,” Chaeyeon continues, “I feel a kinship, talking to you. We’re similar in many ways: quietly ambitious, more talkative than we seem, extremely serious in the things we invest ourselves in. It was…reassuring, seeing someone wanting more so unapologetically, despite having ticked off so many adulthood boxes already.”</p><p>Wonwoo nearly spits his drink. <em>“Me?</em> My seams are barely holding it together. I’m hardly the model for adulthood.”</p><p>Chaeyeon blinks at him, eyes wide and bright. “I genuinely never got that impression. I still don’t, even though you’ve said that. Honestly, it makes me feel that much closer to you.”</p><p>A sensation like warm fingers clenches around Wonwoo’s throat, his chest. Chaeyeon has always given off this air of beautiful professionalism, this put-together woman with a mouth and shoulders resilient enough to carry Mingyu’s team around for their endless itineraries. But then he sees that her pin-straight hair is a little disheveled today, blouse untucked on one side of her pencil skirt. She’s taken off her heels. The lipstick imprint on her glass isn't wiped away. Maybe this goes to show just how inaccurate the people in his mind really are.</p><p>“Alright. Well.” Wonwoo is nursing his drink. “You always contact me for a reason, and it’s rarely, if ever, for yourself.”</p><p>A small smirk passes through her face before she sighs, takes another hefty sip of her daiquiri and squarely faces Wonwoo. “I’m asking you to talk to your dongsaeng again,” she says. “He feels like he’s done something very wrong and this whole mess is entirely his fault.”</p><p>“It’s not!” comes out of Wonwoo faster than he can think it. “I mean, he’s not the only one at fault. As the older one, I should’ve known. I mean, we both got carried away.”</p><p>“You think <em>you’ve</em> done something wrong.”</p><p>“Haven’t I?”</p><p>A snort splits Chaeyeon’s red-tinted lips apart, soft cheeks turning pinker as they curl into her eyes.</p><p>“Like sunbae, like hoobae,” she sighs, “Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude. It’s just, the parallels between you two are actually incredible. Or should I say cinematic parallels, to be extra thematic?”</p><p>Wonwoo can’t look at her. Chaeyeon continues anyway.</p><p>“Watching Mingyu over the years, I’ve realized that all these rules we impose are so arbitrary, and it’s incredible how hard we try to subscribe to them. No elbows on the table. Only one rinse cycle with the dishwasher. Men date women. Be this, do that, but isn’t it all because of some audience we’ve made in our heads?”</p><p>“If you’re saying ‘screw social norms’, fine, I get it, but external judgment is still real—”</p><p>“And in <em>this</em> country? Yeah, what a hellhole that can be. What I’m saying, Mister Jeon,” says Chaeyeon, firmly, “Is that both you and Mingyu are so burdened by what you <em>think</em> others think of you. By that definition, those judgments in your head? They don’t belong to anyone. Literally. At least, that’s how I see it. So you should try to take control of them and not let them affect you. Did any of that make sense?”</p><p>Wonwoo stares back at her, hand around his glass growing increasingly damp.</p><p>“Oh, shit, I’m not gaslighting you, I swear, at least I’m not trying to. Other people’s words can definitely have a tangible effect on you and that’s okay, I was really just talking about what’s solely in the mind and, fuck, I think the alcohol is really getting to me and I’ve been told that I’m a rambling drunk, so…”</p><p>Like sunbae, like hoobae. Sure. But she’s a lot more like Mingyu than she lets on.</p><p>Wonwoo, he—he gets it. The moment Chaeyeon says <em>They don’t belong to anyone. Literally,</em> it feels like a rope pulled to a near rip has been released. Still stretched, still permanently altered, but it feels like he can breathe again despite the congestion of the bar they’re in.</p><p>“Have you ever considered becoming a therapist?” Wonwoo asks, Moscow mule once again on his lips. “You’re a good talker. I guess that’s a prerequisite for managerial work.”</p><p>“Aw shucks, now you’re just saying that.”</p><p>“No, it’s true. I’m not frowning anymore, which is a big improvement.”</p><p>“Now that you mention it, you do look five years younger, but you’ve always looked like you’re about to age at least a decade.”</p><p>At that, Wonwoo does feel at ease enough to share a laugh with her. He even considers the thought of leaving that rare smile on his face.</p><p>“I barely have the strength to keep up with one stressed twenty-something. More than that and I’d probably go crazy,” Chaeyeon scoffs, warmed cheek in hand. “I only said as much as I did because I know Mingyu well enough. Thought you’d benefit from the same conversation I had with him.”</p><p>“I did. Really.” Wonwoo offers a brief bow of his head. “Thank you.”</p><p>“Does that mean you’ll talk to Mingyu?”</p><p>Chaeyeon is staring so earnestly, worried, at the question.</p><p>“I,” says Wonwoo, “I’ll try.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>In many ways, Wonwoo feels like that younger version of himself, fresh out of graduation and moving into his first apartment.</p><p>No sense of translating personality to interior decoration; killed his first potted plant two weeks into co-habitation; simultaneously driven, ruthless at times, yet also terribly naive about how the world actually works. It still feels like he knows nothing about being an actual adult, if all the concern he’s gathered from others—Chaeyeon, Jun, Joshua, Soonyoung, even Lee Jihoon, of all people, and maybe Jeonghan at one point—is any indication.</p><p>And Wonwoo imagined feeling absolutely terrible, pitied and looked down upon for being so inadequate.</p><p>And yet doesn’t. At least, not as much as before.</p><p>Rather, he feels…seen, strangely enough. Is this what Mingyu meant, the first time he said those same words to Wonwoo long ago?</p><p>The thought gets curtailed when a loud “Jeon Wonwoo!” cuts through the air.</p><p>Wonwoo winces at the volume and winces again when an arm lumbers onto his shoulders. As much as he’s grown to admire Jeonghan, interacting with the guy will never cease to be an endeavor.</p><p>“Didn’t think you’d show up to the celebration dinner,” says Jeonghan through the alcoholic slur to his voice. Smells like it, too. “Definitely didn’t seem that interested in it when I brought it up in our last writer’s meeting <em>weeks</em> ago, but looks like you had a change of heart, didn’t ya!”</p><p>“You could, uh, you could say that.”</p><p>Wonwoo immediately scans the room past Jeonghan’s face. Closest is Jihoon at the head of the production team’s table, offering a small wave of acknowledgement before returning to whatever he was saying. Seungcheol is with the main cast and fighting over rights to the barbecue tongs. There’s also Hansol with the writing team and a nice color to his cheeky, ever-grinning face.</p><p>No Kim Mingyu.</p><p>Wonwoo eventually finds Wen Junhui squished into one corner with some other supporting actors and a whole lot of beer. Wonwoo’s name seems to petrify Jun’s body into an artistic configuration of limbs; Wonwoo’s guilt is nearly overcome by the sheer comedy of it. He just nods at Jun, which is more than enough to melt him into raising a half-filled beer glass.</p><p>Wonwoo scans the room again. Still no Mingyu.</p><p>“Looking for someone?”</p><p>“Yeah, I’m looking for Mingyu.”</p><p>Jeonghan doesn’t say anything, looking almost taken aback by Wonwoo’s quick admission.</p><p>But before Jeonghan can try cracking another joke about nosy set assistants, Jihoon looks up at Wonwoo.</p><p>“Guess you didn’t see the news.” Jihoon looks more stone-faced than usual. “Mingyu fainted at a fan event today."</p><p>The lag in the tumult feels like the lag in a stream, as if the Internet had cut out for a moment before restoring in fear of the backlash that could follow. If some nosy assholes are listening in on the hot goss, they’re doing a great job of masking it.</p><p>"Heard his company really ramped up his workload recently," Jihoon says, "Something about bolstering that public image of his. I don’t understand why. Maximizing public image before film promotions is one thing, but damn, if Really Fucking Overworked had a dictionary definition, Kim Mingyu'd be the face right next to it.”</p><p>Jeonghan finally slides off Wonwoo and shrugs. “The bastard of a CEO is working him like a dog. Never took this movie seriously, from what I heard. I met him once, yeah? During some weird cult-y entertainment CEO thing and he <em>loved</em> talking out of his ass about how he ‘saved’ Mingyu or whatever…”</p><p>The restaurant noise returns to normal, but Wonwoo still feels paralyzed where he stands. Jihoon is staring back.</p><p>After a few moments, suffocating in the noise and smoke and grease smell of grilling meats, Jihoon reaches over to slip Wonwoo’s phone out of his pocket. He holds it up, for Wonwoo to take.</p><p>“Man of the hour, star of the show,” says Jihoon, offering a one-sided cheers with a beer bottle that looks like it’s melting, “I wonder what’s he’s going to do next.”</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>In which good people make questionable decisions. Like humans! I write this in spite of, or perhaps <i>because</i> of, my intense love for melodrama and confrontations.</p><p>The eighth chapter might be the last with the ninth being a bonus/chapter or epilogue. That's the current plan, at least. So I'll see you in the next (and sort of last) installment in a few weeks!</p><p> </p><p>
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        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>When Wonwoo flails out of the couch he was sleeping on to the alarm of a scream, he nearly hits his head on the nearby coffee table. He doesn’t, luckily, because he knows he <em>still</em> doesn’t have room on his Google Calendar for a hospital visit, at least until that weird limbo of work and not-work between Christmas and New Year’s. But the impact of his shoulder against the table legs is enough to shock his glasses into nearly stabbing an eye.</p><p>“Shit, ow,” he groans. “What the <em>hell</em> are you being so loud for?”</p><p>This is exactly why he lives solo, because having an extra mouth and body in the same household is the same as cohabitating with noise pollution.</p><p>Readjusting his glasses, a sudden realization hits that no, he’s not in his own apartment, and no, he hasn’t had roommates since university. Rather, he may have become a temporary roommate himself.</p><p>“Oh. Right. Sorry.” Wonwoo clears his throat. “Um. Hi?”</p><p>On the other side of a rather plain but well-kept living room is Kim Mingyu.</p><p>Ex-idol extraordinaire, the up-and-coming darling of the entertainment industry, a Professional Hot Guy—in all of his tired, eye-bagged and bedheaded glory. Mouth still slightly ajar from the monstrous sound that came out of it. Baptized in sweat. House shirt looking like it hasn’t seen an iron in years. It seems like whatever color left in Mingyu body was shocked out of his system at the sight of a second body in his one-bedroom apartment. That much, Wonwoo can understand.</p><p>No one moves, not daring enough to face whatever comes next yet. Maybe they aren’t prepared for this. Wonwoo has to slow his breathing to accommodate the tightening space inside.</p><p>Four counts in. Four counts out.</p><p>And then, ever the brave one, Mingyu takes the plunge.</p><p>“Am I hallucinating?” he says. His face is completely straight.</p><p>“Me? No, no, I’m actually here, I’m pretty sure,” says Wonwoo, patting his arms in as much confirmation for himself as Mingyu. “For anything else you might be seeing, though, I can’t tell you.”</p><p>“You were on my couch.”</p><p>“I was.”</p><p>“You’re in my apartment.”</p><p>“I am.”</p><p>“Should I be calling security?”</p><p>“Maybe? I wouldn’t judge you if you did. I mean, if a real robber or crazy-ass fan were here in my place, I would hope you’d be more alert. I’m neither of those things, by the way. Just to be clear.” Wonwoo coughs, <em>very</em> unconvincingly. “Chaeyeon let me in, if you must know.”</p><p>Indeed she did, though not immediately after Wonwoo’s talk with Jihoon. Following that was a convenience store detour to stock up on all the medicine and hot foods Soonyoung used to stuff down Wonwoo’s throat way back in university flu seasons, even after they stopped being roommates.</p><p>Wonwoo stands up, palms his face back to some shred of confidence. Surely, he should be capable of the bare minimum. “Go back to bed. I can bring you what you got up for. Water I’m guessing?”</p><p>Wordlessly, Mingyu nods.</p><p>“I’ll bring a few other things as well. Don’t worry about staying awake, if you can’t. But do open your closet door before you sleep, so I know where to get spare clothes.”</p><p>“For yourself?”</p><p>“For you. It’s not good to sleep in sweaty clothes.”</p><p>Mingyu’s sharp inhale is made even noisier by the congestion. He almost chokes on it and Wonwoo almost trips over a throw pillow to get that water he promised.</p><p>“I can change myself,” says Mingyu, flailing a hand around and doing an awful job of hiding his face behind his nest of a bedhead. “Luckily I’m still, uh, in good enough condition to. To do that. In fact, now that you mentioned it, I’ll do that right now—”</p><p>Wonwoo feels his entire face flush warm. “Shit, I’m sorry, I promise I didn’t mean to overstep. It’s just, you know, getting sick from over-exertion is double the physical fatigue so doing things by yourself can be…difficult.”</p><p>Words from personal experience. Head scratch, hands restless.</p><p>“If you want me to leave, you can say so.”</p><p>Wonwoo doesn’t say it with malice, not with double meaning or script-like clarity. And maybe Mingyu hears this absence, when he stays put.</p><p>Eventually, Mingyu says, “More than anything, I’m worried that you’ll get sick, too.”</p><p>Something in Wonwoo’s stomach twists.</p><p>He is reminded again of the double-edged sword to the openness Mingyu practices. No doubt, it’s been slandered and dragged through the mud before crawling back to the starting line, and again it will happen. But if there’s any glimmer for control left in the great Jeon Wonwoo, he might as well use it to not do the same.</p><p>“I don’t think I'll catch it,” says Wonwoo. “I’m pretty sure you’re sick because you were overworked. No doubt because of—”</p><p>“If you mention those photos—”</p><p>“I was going to say the film. Getting your name out more, doing more activities, to maximize the eyes that will be on the trailer when it’s out. Or so I’ve been told. And simply the fact that your schedule wasn’t made for humans to begin with.”</p><p>“Must be serious, then,” says Mingyu, “if you’re telling me that.”</p><p>Mingyu’s volume grows quieter with every word as Wonwoo walks over the room-wide gap between them. It’s a ravine with a depth of danger crossing it. But Wonwoo didn’t even realize he’d moved until he’s already standing in front of the face, the voice, the words that have occupied his head for months. They still do.</p><p>Just an arm’s length away. One more stride, and he’s there. Wonwoo remains where he is.</p><p>“Go rest. I’ll bring you something to eat, too.”</p><p>It’s only because Wonwoo has thought of Mingyu’s neck so many times that he notices it faintly tighten before relaxing.</p><p>“We can talk when you’re feeling better,” Wonwoo adds. “Now shoo, or I’m going to force you into bed.”</p><p>That’s as much as Mingyu is willing to take in his state, scuttling off to where Wonwoo assumes is the bedroom.</p><p>There is no sound of the door closing.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“You should close the door next time. Your place is draftier than I expected.”</p><p>Wonwoo pushes through the opening with a hip, hands busy with a tray of reheated samgyetang, hot pear tea and medicine; the smells are weirdly disparate. A cold bottle of water has frozen the squeezed space between ribcage and forearm, but Wonwoo is too worried about dropping it and embarrassing himself more than he already has.</p><p>Mingyu tries to sit up with a grunt he can’t stifle, so Wonwoo quickly sets the tray aside before occupying his hands with more pressing matters. Swiftly, one hand supports the space between Mingyu’s shoulder blades as the other rearranges the pillows.</p><p>“Nauseous? Dizzy?” he asks, gently guiding Mingyu’s neck to curve over the lip of the headrest. “I brought cold water, but I can warm it up if that’s easier to swallow.”</p><p>“I’d imagined you were some starving artist or writer who worked himself to the bone. Little regard for your own health,” mumbles Mingyu. His face seems conflicted with whether to grin or not. “You sound very thorough. And prepared.”</p><p>“It’s not impossible to be all of the above.” Wonwoo pulls the sheet and duvet to Mingyu’s lap. “One of my best friends is a nurse. My younger brother was ill often when we were kids, and our parents were working all the time to support us. Not many aspirations to wrack my head over then.”</p><p>“Lucky younger brother. I wish I had the chance to do that with my dongsaeng, when I was younger.”</p><p>“But you were busy with training.”</p><p>“Yes. I was.”</p><p>Mouth dry with both nothing and too many things, Wonwoo instead fixates on the tray he’d brought. Straighten the chopsticks. Smooth out the napkin. Take out two pain relievers and set aside two more for the next time Mingyu wakes up too early. It feels like exercising an old muscle Wonwoo didn’t realize he still had.</p><p>When he places the tray on Mingyu’s lap, Mingyu doesn’t look at him. It probably stands to reason that Wonwoo shouldn’t do the same.</p><p>“I had a lunch with Wen Junhui,” says Mingyu, “the day before the last of filming.”</p><p>Wonwoo almost drops the water bottle.</p><p>“Well, more accurately, he had a talk with me. He told me some…interesting things. He admitted he never asked you if he could.”</p><p>“And you still let me inside?”</p><p>“I thought it was a good opportunity to talk. Like you said.”</p><p><em>And he still let you inside,</em> repeats Wonwoo in his mind, the traitorous thing that it is.

</p><p>Wonwoo takes a seat on the ground. Elaborate drawer handles dig into his back. His fingers are fiddling and picking idly in his lap with nothing else to hold onto. Down here, he can to maintain some strength to his voice without having to stand, or hear Mingyu’s voice in full.</p><p>“I’d ask you about what he told you,” Wonwoo says after a moment, “But I feel like it wouldn’t be right to ask without being honest myself.”</p><p>“It’s not really my business to know—”</p><p>“No, no, it is. It is your business. I made it your business after we…we…”</p><p>“Got together? Erm, well, if that’s something I can say.”</p><p>Wonwoo has to inhale to stop himself from blurting: <em>I didn’t know if </em>I<em> was allowed to say it.</em></p><p>“Frankly, I don’t think I deserve the attention you’ve given me,” he says instead. “I feel like my life is constantly riddled with mistakes, both career-wise and with people. But I’d be lying to myself if I didn’t realize how working with you was, undoubtedly, one of the best things that’s ever happened to me.”</p><p>“Because,” hesitates Mingyu, “Because of the movie?”</p><p>“Because you made me smile.” Wonwoo can barely hear himself from the ringing in his ears. “Because you kept listening to me, and trying to be better, and made me feel like—like I can <em>still</em> do meaningful things. You were a constant reminder of this damn thing stuck in my chest and all the feelings I’d kept out of its reach because I thought, without it, work would be easier. I’d get to do what I dreamed of doing eventually. It’s probably obvious that I don’t know how to deal with, with…”</p><p>“With romance? Oh, shit, sorry, I keep putting words in your mouth.”</p><p>A single laugh escapes Wonwoo. “Better you than me, honestly. And I suppose that’s one way of putting it. Experiencing romance is, to my surprise, different from acting it out.”</p><p>“Tell me about it.”</p><p>“I was going to, actually, but I realize that you’re literally sick and we don’t have much time for the details. I do want to say this much now: I’ve got past baggage—no one saw that coming, I’m sure—and it’s impacted me a lot and how I see the world, how I treat people,” Wonwoo takes a deep breath, “Including you. I wanted to apologize for anything rash I’d done that hurt you. I’m not a particularly good person. But you probably learned that already.”</p><p>Silence finally takes its turn, save for the sound of sips up above. The crinkle of a water bottle happens at some point, like combat boots in a vast autumn forest. The difference, Wonwoo supposes, is that someone is present to actually hear it.</p><p>“Would you be surprised to know that I had some idea of your relationship with Jun? Pretty early on, actually.”</p><p>Wonwoo pinches himself to keep from cursing. After all the emotional vomit, <em>that</em> was the last thing he wanted to hear.</p><p>“Was it because of the time in the bathroom?” he dreads to ask.</p><p>“Let’s just say that sandals don’t squeak like rubber shoes on vinyl floors.” A short, hoarse chuckle. “That, and I saw him plant one on you during lunch that day. I’ll admit that subtleties can go over my head sometimes, but that much, I think I understood.”</p><p>“Leave it to that cheeky bastard to out us both,” Wonwoo grumbles through his teeth. “Not that I’m any better, I suppose.”</p><p>He blinks a few times, and something suddenly clicks.</p><p>“Wait, you <em>still</em> went into the bathroom?”</p><p>Wonwoo hears some loud clanking noise before Mingyu splutters out, “Hey, to be fair, I didn’t know <em>both </em>of you were in there until I started talking to you and then I went ‘Oh shit that’s happening’ but I couldn’t possibly make it obvious that I knew so, clearly, I had to keep babbling about random stuff instead of walking away like a smart person and I did forget about it for a bit when I was talking to you, but, well, looks my acting was convincing enough at the time if you had no idea.”</p><p>“There was a door between us! How the hell was I supposed to know you were bullshitting me?”</p><p>“You just don’t want to say my acting was decent!”</p><p>“You literally said you forgot in the middle of it!”</p><p>Mingyu sighs a white flag.</p><p>So much for all that room-length staring from him that Wonwoo was so fond of. He buries his face into his hands, groans through the seams of his fingers with the embarrassment aching crawling all the way to his roots. God, he’s so stupid to have let any of that shit happen, to have had his self-control trampled and spat on by monkey brain urges at <em>work, Jeon Wonwoo</em>—</p><p>The glare he’s subjecting his ankles to is infiltrated by the appearance of another pair of feet. He hears cloth slide on cloth. Now, another body starts occupying this corner of the world.</p><p>“You’re not a bad person. I’ve never thought that. You’re just...a person,” says Mingyu. “You don’t have much practice in some things. Like me, when this whole thing started.”</p><p>“I might not be bad, then. But I’m certainly not good.”</p><p>“Good? Or good enough?”</p><p>“What’s the difference?”</p><p>It sounds more stupid out loud, and it was careless of Wonwoo to say it. Mingyu hums a noise, like understanding.</p><p>“Do you think I’m a good person, hyung?” he asks.</p><p>Wonwoo’s eyes, even in their strain, dart towards Mingyu at the honorific. “Undoubtedly,” he says.</p><p>“Even though I knew? Even though I continued to ask for your time outside work hours? And invited you to be alone with me on a date? And kissed you?”</p><p>Wonwoo’s mouth opens—<em>I’m the one who kissed you—</em>but nothing comes out.</p><p>“You know, when I got really popular, I learned that it’s really easy to villainize names in articles or one-sided rumors. But when you actually get to know people, categories like ‘good’ and ‘bad’ don’t work so well.”</p><p>Wonwoo watches Mingyu pull his knees closer, like an extra shield for what lies behind them. Odd is the image of a physically grand person making himself smaller.</p><p>Mingyu continues: “I want to tell you something, too. When my group broke up, I dove into solo work. That’s all I ever knew. I felt like I had to do everything to prove that we, or maybe <em>I </em>was worth it. I forgot about working with you, actually, because my mind was so preoccupied with nothing but work. Meeting you for the ‘first time’ a second time? You said it was acting. But it was real.”</p><p>“And somehow you ended up interested in me,” murmurs Wonwoo, “Again.”</p><p>“Oh yeah,” Mingyu chuckles. “Script aside, you’re a sunbae and hyung who’s exciting to push back against, <em>safe</em> to push against, handsome as hell with a voice and gaze that could rip me a new one and I’d thank you for it. And that’s not even mentioning the way you use words. You might not be a public figure, but people are drawn to you in ways you wouldn’t believe.”</p><p>“I, that’s,” <em>not true</em>. Wonwoo swallows a dry throat. “You say that as if droves of people aren’t drawn to you every single day. Even if much of it is disingenuous or fleeting, I’m sure there are many who genuinely like you.”</p><p>“Including you, hyung?”</p><p>Wonwoo has to huff in disbelief at that. He sees a change in expression, tired but cheeky, in the corner of his eye.</p><p>“I’m jealous of you,” Mingyu says, “The producer, the director, set assistants and writers, Junhui, Joshua, even Chaeyeon and I’m sure many others out of the industry—people just seem to connect with you, for real. You’re not someone who’d stick around artifice for long, despite the work. That’s a good trait to have.”</p><p>“There’s no point wasting time on people who will waste it for me. I’d rather spend it productively.”</p><p>Something like a smile spreads across Mingyu’s face.</p><p>“You always say I’m busy, but <em>you</em> were so busy, you know. God, I felt so greedy every time I asked you for extra practices, especially on the weekends.”</p><p>“Greedy?” Wonwoo is genuinely baffled. “You were?”</p><p>“I feel like I need to underline that I am, in fact, not a perfect person; crazy to say for someone whose job is to be that, I know.” Mingyu laughs a little. “Like, sure, you weren’t dating, but I still pursued you when you were involved with someone else.”</p><p>“But,” Wonwoo’s brows pinch, “But how did you know that Jun and I, that we weren’t committed—”</p><p>“I didn’t.”</p><p>Again, Wonwoo is wiped of response.</p><p>“I’m not proud of it,” Mingyu confesses, “And talking to Jun doesn’t completely absolve anything, either. I guess the point I’m trying to make is that I’m far from however most people imagine me. But there was a point at which I had to see myself as ‘good enough’ to keep going. You thought I was good enough, way back when.”</p><p>“I,” Wonwoo’s voice cracks, “I still do.”</p><p>“I know. And that’s a big part of why I like you so much.”</p><p>At this rate, Wonwoo feels like his face is a fireplace. It’s honestly a wonder, how Mingyu makes honesty sound so easy.</p><p>He taps his chin. “Now that I think about it, you were the one who taught me that people don’t have to be extraordinary to deserve support.”</p><p>“Is, is this,” says Wonwoo, eyes narrow, “Is this just some long and winding way for you to try and convince me against my own words, Kim Mingyu?”</p><p>Mingyu releases his knees, legs straightening out again like an opening paper fan. His ankles come to rest on another pair.</p><p>“Actually,” he says, “I’d argue that I’m using your own words against you, Jeon Wonwoo. Maybe that way, you’ll eventually listen.”</p><p>Wonwoo visibly looks like he’s chewing through a response that he can’t use. He freezes at the shift of Mingyu’s feet; there is still cloth between them, but the weight is familiar, like the stubborn way Mingyu still skips over honorifics like stones on still water.</p><p>“I’ve been told that I,” mumbles Wonwoo, “I have unhealthy expectations for people, in my head.”</p><p>“I’ve been told that this type of work makes us feel that way.”</p><p>“A single conversation won’t break bad habits, though.”</p><p>“So let’s have more conversations. Let me be the one to help you, hyung.”</p><p>Mingyu’s hand reaches over on the carpet, fingertips bumping against Wonwoo’s. Now, they are touching at two places at once. It’s barely anything in comparison to the past, and yet Wonwoo feels so much more disconnected to his own lungs; this is a sign that, indeed, perhaps there’s no need to try and talk himself out of it.</p><p>“But I have to say, maybe we can talk more when I feel less nauseous,” Mingyu says with a mild warble. “I already managed to not puke on you once, and I’m hoping to continue that streak.”</p><p>For the first time in a while, Wonwoo lets himself laugh, truly unbridled.</p><p>It’s a long and strangely easy moment, despite the way Mingyu’s head bobs loosely and his breaths turn quieter, slow. There are two bodies here seeking rest after so much burden.</p><p>In this moment, in this meeting between a dresser with elaborate handles and bed housing a half-finished tray of food on it, there is no work. There is no schedule. For once, it’s not so hard to think that way.</p><p>“Thank you, Mingyu.”</p><p>Through the exhaustion, there is a wide, so very handsome smile to Mingyu’s face when Wonwoo says that. Maybe it’s not too farfetched to imagine that Wonwoo is the cause of it.</p><p>“Hold out your arms,” he says, standing up and supporting the limbs already stretching out towards him. “I’ll help you back into bed.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>It’s after Mingyu’s second dose of medicine that Wonwoo takes his leave.</p><p>This season’s variety is picking up rapidly with an unprecedented number of A-to-Z-list actors, singers, and every other form of celebrity taking stage in the half dark, half blindingly lit studios. Any scraps of Wonwoo’s free time see a new pair of glasses after years of denying worsening vision; late nights filming with daytime hours booked by bigger names; less and less contact about the movie itself, with fine-tuned edits, legalities, and marketing no longer needing a creative writer’s voice. Wonwoo’s pockets feel full of loose ends. His hands don’t know where to start.</p><p>Even greater is the struggle when, lo and behold, it’s about time Wonwoo’s “real” work finally intersects with Mingyu’s. Wonwoo honestly never imagined it would ever happen. But it does.</p><p>“My doctor approved me to work this morning,” says Mingyu, plainly, in the lunch-empty writer’s room Wonwoo drags him into. “I’m not in peak condition, but I can still work.”</p><p>Something hypocritical sits behind Wonwoo’s teeth. He releases his grip on Mingyu’s jacket sleeve.</p><p>“I know it hasn’t been long since you, uh, came over to my place,” Mingyu rubs his neck, drawing more attention to it than he should, really, “But if it makes you uncomfortable, I can try to tell the set manager or director that, I don’t know, I had you run out to grab coffee or something. Coffee for everyone, on me, and then you can order everything one by one so you can take up more time and it’d be pretty convincing coming from you anyway—”</p><p>“No no, it’s fine. You’re fine.” Something light blooms in Wonwoo’s chest when he says, “I’m just glad to see that you’re better. Please take it easy today.”</p><p>Like ink dropped on paper, a small smile spreads larger across Mingyu’s face. The color returned to it is certainly welcome.</p><p>“My company thought it would be good to guest here,” says Mingyu. “The idol groups aren’t huge, but with how many come on, the audience is pretty widespread. And my name isn’t entirely detached from the culture, so I still fit the bill.”</p><p>“Hm, I don’t know, you’re too...comfortable.”</p><p>“Comfortable?”</p><p>“Not enough awkwardness with the hosts’ shitty humor. Or people-pleasing desperation.”</p><p>“Do you want me to be desperate? Because I can be.”</p><p>Oh <i>here</i> we go. Lots of bold selective hearing from someone who got the hospital shoulder pat just this morning.</p><p>Wonwoo attempts diversion: “You should’ve heard the staff when they learned there was a chance to have you booked. Never seen the studio manager so passionate about getting new lights.”</p><p>“You didn’t try to convince anyone against bringing me here?”</p><p>“How could I,” Wonwoo’s lips feel awfully chapped, “How could any of us possibly say no to such a big celebrity name?”</p><p>The big celebrity himself leans a hair closer. His gaze is dark and luminous, outlined by the darker eyeshadows painted around it. A few strands of hair dangle in front. Wonwoo’s fingers twitch.</p><p>“Right. You didn’t do it before.” Mingyu says this while smoothing down the wrinkles on his shirt, on his chest. Wonwoo watches him do it. “What other things could I get with this name, do you think?”</p><p>Wonwoo cocks his head. “It’s not like you won’t get enough screen time. The staff and cameras love that you’re here. I’m sure you’ll have the editing team wrapped around your finger without even lifting one. What else could you possibly be looking for around such a small-time variety studio?”</p><p>“Someone, rather than something,” says Mingyu, full of intent. “Come with me to the movie premiere.”</p><p>The statement-question makes Wonwoo stiffen immediately, like melted sugar dropped in ice water. His chin quickly downturns with his attention in tow. Maybe he should’ve been smart enough to bring a jacket with him, with the goosebumps suddenly raising on his arms.</p><p>“Jeonghan told me I was invited. I still haven’t decided if I’d be going.”</p><p>“Why not? You of all people deserve to be there.”</p><p>“I still—those photos, if I’m there, I don’t know—”</p><p>Warmth starts to wrap around Wonwoo. He startles at the consideration that Mingyu might be embracing him at work just to be childish about the predicament, maybe even to shut Wonwoo up. But it’s not that.</p><p>Mingyu has draped his jacket around Wonwoo, though it frankly isn’t at all as warm as other sources in the vicinity. The scent of it slides over his skin. Wonwoo doesn’t know what to do with himself now, when new cloth on one person means less on another.</p><p>It’s a statement of belonging, more than anything.</p><p>“I can’t possibly go back to the studio wearing this,” says Wonwoo, helpless to the softness of his voice, “Not when they match your slacks.”</p><p>“We could pass it off as another show of my goodwill.”</p><p>“But couple clothes are <em>so </em>tacky.”</p><p>“We won’t get matching suits, then.” Mingyu tugs at the jacket on Wonwoo like he’s adjusting it; he is not. “How about matching tie clips? Or cufflinks? Or we could get a single set of cufflinks and we each get one.”</p><p>“Isn’t it weird to have just one? What if someone asks?”</p><p>“I’ll just say I lost the other in the press tumult.”</p><p>“You’re saying all this like I’ve agreed to go.”</p><p>“Let me convince you, then, hyung.”</p><p>What was once an empty room fills with change. Wonwoo feels so surrounded with no gap for escape, he might be subsumed by it. His tongue is tied. He’s out of practice compared to Mingyu. Or perhaps it finally feels like there is direction to the chase, and Wonwoo has been standing still long enough to be overcome.</p><p>An easy retort is to say, <em>You can’t convince me</em>, and Wonwoo just about says it. But Mingyu isn’t nudging them in a cheeky direction; that much is easy to spot. Rather, it’s a request for Wonwoo to listen. To let himself listen.</p><p>After a while, Wonwoo settles on: “I’ll think about it. Have you eaten yet?”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“I have, how about you?”</p><p>“Me as well, thank you for asking! I got this banh mi and an iced tea from this food truck that opened up near the office and they are absolutely di<em>vine</em>,” says Jeonghan into a satisfied drawl. Wonwoo twitches at the cacophonous sip that comes through the phone speaker. “How are you faring these days, Mister Jeon?</p><p>Wonwoo blinks into the empty space of his bedroom at the question. That’s the last thing he expected Yoon Jeonghan to ask of him, on a post-work Friday evening.</p><p>“I’m getting by,” Wonwoo says eventually. “To be honest, I’ve been rather preoccupied with the recent wave of idol comebacks, but if this is about blurbs for the ads, I can try to draft—”</p><p>“My dear,” interrupts Jeonghan, tone indiscernible, “You’ve read the email we sent you, right?”</p><p>Wonwoo pinches the space between his eyes. “I have.”</p><p>“Call me biased as hell, but I’d like to think that our offer is far more attractive than whatever you’re currently sitting on. You’ve even got the CEO calling you!”</p><p>“I’m very grateful, sir. Really. It’s just, there’s been a lot on my mind recently so I haven’t had much time to think about it.”</p><p>“…still held up over those photos, are you?”</p><p>“I am. My apologies.”</p><p>Jeonghan’s exhale sounds like he’s used his entire chest to do produce it.</p><p>“I’m going to assume that Kim Mingyu has tried to convince you to go on at least one occasion,” says Jeonghan, tutting, “But he’s also under a strict NDA a la <em>moi,</em> which means he’ll be so grounded, he sees the center of the Earth if he makes so much as a peep without a set to peep on. You know he went viral once just for being shit at not spoiling people? I had this whole argument with the casting director about how she only cared about his face and she said, ‘That’s not true! He’s got a great body, too, and he’s super cute and nice with great potential’ and I was like, ‘You’re not wrong but I’ve still gotta make this shit work’—anyway, we ended up compromising with a strong legal mouth zipper.”</p><p>“Makes...sense.”</p><p>“Since <em>I’m</em> not under an NDA, however, I can tell you there were some tweaks made beyond loverboy’s allowance to discuss. Call it an executive decision on my part. Because I can do that.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s eyebrows knit. “Changes? What sort of changes?”</p><p>“Let’s just say we put Jaesang and Chunghee in some…compromising positions. Had to rush back to that damn beach, but it was worth filming a nice sneaky getaway for two lovebirds after their coach abandoned his mini villa to drink local.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s breath stutters out of him.</p><p>
  <em>That way, it looks like a last-minute scene, or even a practice session for it. It’s a lie that, with enough mouths, can be argued into truth. Hell, Jeonghan would use in-house paparazzi photos for the damn promotional material.</em>
</p><p>Another noisy sip from Jeonghan alerts Wonwoo of the silence he’s dragging out. No reaction feels appropriate.</p><p>“I think it would be in your interest to see what I mean,” continues Jeonghan, far too fucking chipper for his own good, “It’s more fun that way.”</p><p>“And the director approved of these changes?”</p><p>“Ah, so <em>that’s</em> where your loyalty lies.”</p><p>“Jihoon and I are the same age, so it was easy to befriend him. No hard feelings, Mister Yoon.”</p><p>Jeonghan’s boisterous cackle is as relieving as it is noisy—which is to say, a decent amount. Mingyu was right, a good-humored sunbae is a rarity. No wonder he clung so tightly. Jeonghan himself is still very young, so Wonwoo wouldn’t be surprised if the sentiment was shared there, too.</p><p>“You’re a fun one, Jeon Wonwoo,” he hears Jeonghan say. “If I don’t see you in the office, I should hope to see you at the premiere—or the after party, at the very least, so I can drink you under the fucking table.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>The pot has certainly been made sweeter with the challenge of taking down a peg one of the youngest CEOs in Korean entertainment today. If Joshua Hong’s stubborn Western narrative has taught Wonwoo anything, it’s that The Man always needs a reality check. And this time alcohol is involved, which is as good of a cultural crutch and excuse as any to do just that.</p><p>“You say that as if you’re a drinking god,” Soonyoung says, rolling his eyes. “I know your work or whatever makes it a survival skill, but that high horse attitude you have sometimes is so far up your ass, you’ve become a centaur.”</p><p>Wonwoo sips primly the beer that definitely isn’t affecting him. At all. “How specifically worded. And gross. I am simultaneously impressed and extremely offended.”</p><p>Junhui bites into his fried chicken. “At this rate Soonyoung might have to transfer out of the pediatrics unit. The shitty metaphors you’ve cursed him with could infect the children.”</p><p>“I hate you both.”</p><p>“Your brain says this,” says Soonyoung, “But your heart begs to differ.”</p><p>“Oh god, now he’s making one-liners,” mutters Jun. “Soonyoung, buddy, I say this lovingly, but I think you should take a shower, or at least quarantine from Wonwoo for two weeks minimum—”</p><p>Suddenly, there is a knock at the door. Which is weird, because the three of them always order from the same places that always send the same delivery guys. They all know how to use the intercom.</p><p>After a moment: “Neither of were feeling adventurous with dinner, were you?” asks Wonwoo.</p><p>Both Soonyoung and Junhui shake their heads. One of them pauses the movie; a classic chick flick for the good vibes, obviously.</p><p>“As master of the household, I guess I’ll answer it,” Wonwoo says, nearly tripping over Junhui and a box of radish cubes at the foot of the couch. “Hopefully it’s not the health authorities. Well, I guess we already have one here, since nurses count.”</p><p>“Fuck yeah, they do,” Soonyoung calls after him.</p><p>By the time Wonwoo has reached the door, the brain so quick to quip earlier hasn’t bothered to catching up and guess who is about to knock down his door, by the sound of it.</p><p>So Wonwoo is genuinely surprised to be met with a black velvet cap he himself wore once upon a time, in sea water, while clutching desperately onto the person who owned the damn thing. And is also here. For some reason.</p><p>“I must’ve done something <em>real</em> nice in a previous life,” Wonwoo mutters, disbelieving. “First order of business is how you know where I live.”</p><p>The paper bag Mingyu is carrying crinkles audibly when he shifts weight on his feet. He glances over Wonwoo’s shoulder.</p><p>“Let’s just say I called in a favor.”</p><p>“You didn’t do anything shady to my ex-FWB, did you?”</p><p>“Shady things to or shady things with? I guess it’s sort of the same, either way.”</p><p>Wonwoo’s face twists. “Fine, I guess I deserved that.”</p><p>“Nah,” Mingyu reaches out to pinch Wonwoo’s scrunched nose, “I was just being sassy. Can I come in? Won't be long.”</p><p>Wonwoo angles himself for Mingyu to enter, to toe off his fancy new sneakers at the door next to several other scuffed and disorganized Converse, flip flops, boots and the like. Mingyu is rather neat about it, too, nudging other shoes into some semblance of intentional placement. Now that Wonwoo thinks about it, even Mingyu’s color-coded walk-in closet and meticulously categorized kitchen space were testaments to exactly this behavior.</p><p>“You’re very neat,” observes Wonwoo as Mingyu rakes fingers through his hair and replaces the cap. “I’m surprised you have any time for neatness.”</p><p>Mingyu shrugs. “A lot of things in my career are out of my hands, so I like having control in my life when I can find it.”</p><p>“Huh. It’s kind of scary, how many people are starting to sound like me these days.”</p><p>“Is that a bad thing?”</p><p>In this narrow space beside the shoe rack, they are close enough to hear each other breath. Ridiculously, Wonwoo’s mind hiccups. Mingyu is too damn fast on the draw. It’s been like this for a while now, even in text messages, as if the one stepping towards the one stepping back has completely shifted.</p><p>Perhaps, it’s the absence of ambiguity that makes Mingyu more confident to relish in clarity.</p><p>“I keep telling you that we’re more alike than you think,” Mingyu says. He leans down so quickly that Wonwoo almost reacts to the would-be kiss. He doesn’t. They aren’t touching. “Do you remember what I said? When you asked me why I took on the movie?”</p><p>Something inexplicable crowds in the back of Wonwoo’s throat, but he manages a hushed, “Because you resonated with the story. You felt seen.”</p><p>“I did. <em>You</em> are the one who saw me. You still do.”</p><p>A howling noise suddenly erupts in Wonwoo’s chest. His body is aching. He wants to devour the gentle, easy smile directed at him and no one else. Wonwoo is reminded of that visage in the ocean water, of Mingyu, alone with him and breathtaking against one of the grandest backdrops Mother Earth could possibly provide. That same person is here in a half-cluttered apartment with chicken boxes and beer bottles only a few rooms away. If Soonyoung and Jun haven’t fled to Wonwoo’s guest room already, they’re doing a damn good job of keeping their mouths shut.</p><p>Wonwoo, against better judgment, hooks a single finger through one of Mingyu’s belt loops.</p><p>With no small effort, he tells Mingyu: “You see me, too. Even when I didn’t know there was enough of me left to see.”</p><p>Mingyu’s paper bag dropping to the floor is the last sound Wonwoo hears before Mingyu kisses him.</p><p>It isn’t forceful by any means. Mingyu kisses like a parched man who still wants to savor the motions like they’re a fine wine. With previous experience doing that, the thought is, in appropriate cliché, intoxicating. Wonwoo’s fingers quickly find purchase above Mingyu’s shirt collar. Mingyu’s breath hitches. The tan color and radiating heat are reminders of what lies beneath.</p><p>Wonwoo quickly grows starved. He moves until his back is flush against the wall, pulling his cargo with him, letting himself become completely swathed in Mingyu’s warmth and weight.</p><p>Mingyu happily accepts the invitation to crowd into Wonwoo, to swallow up what little remains of Wonwoo’s space. One hand greedily runs up and down Wonwoo’s side, the other with gentility at the jaw. Wonwoo wants to laugh at how fitting the difference is. But then gentle touch turns daring, when it discovers purchase on Wonwoo’s hip and the gap enclosed between house shirt and sweatpants.</p><p>Kisses are tipping into ravenous. Wonwoo had forgotten how hot skin on skin can be. His stomach is more sensitive with a hand roaming across it.</p><p>There are so many noises with few openings to escape, and even Mingyu strangles one into another kiss as the master of the household insists on guest accommodations between his legs; sweatpants are great and all, but pants with belt loops to pull on have their benefits.</p><p>“I don’t know if you have time, but I do. Right now,” says Wonwoo. His lips almost touch Mingyu’s again, as they move. “It’s also an offer, not a decision. Or necessity.”</p><p>“You can...feel me, can’t you?”</p><p>“I do. But I don’t want to push things too far, if it's going fast.”</p><p>“To be fair, it’s been months—”</p><p>“It’s different,” Wonwoo says, “Now. I want to do this properly, with you.”</p><p>There’s some victory in not being anticipated for once. Wonwoo feared he’d gotten predictable enough for Mingyu to generate easy responses all the time.</p><p>But Mingyu is silent when he moves his hands to Wonwoo’s neck, that junction between it and the work knots in his shoulders. He kisses Wonwoo’s temple, twice, and somehow it’s both one of the sweetest and most arousing things he has done.</p><p>“Hyung,” Mingyu murmurs into Wonwoo’s tangle of hair, “I know it’s cheesy to say, but I feel like my chest is going to explode.”</p><p>Wonwoo wraps his arms around Mingyu’s waist. “We have a nurse in the building, if that actually happens.”</p><p>“Can he help me get rid of this hard-on when I have to run back to my car in five minutes?”</p><p>“If it’s necessary, I’d rather you let me do it.”</p><p>Mingyu’s laugh is bright and handsome between the kisses he plants across Wonwoo’s twisting expression. It’s a “next time” sort of sentiment. Helplessly, Wonwoo laughs, too.</p><p>It takes a moment or two for them both to regather themselves and to strategically tie one of Wonwoo’s jackets around Mingyu’s hips, but they get there. If anything, Wonwoo is sure dedicated netizens will have a ball trying to calculate lengths based on other lengths.</p><p>Wonwoo picks up Mingyu’s cap from the ground. It had inevitably fallen off in the middle of their enthusiasm. He is suddenly awash with memories of the table read, of the exchange of words and defunct highlighters that happened afterwards. <em>Please take good care of me.</em> God, now <em>his</em> chest feels like exploding.</p><p>Before he thinks better of it, Wonwoo pulls Mingyu by the cheek into one more kiss. He dedicates the sensation to memory for as long as his lungs will let him.</p><p>When they break, Mingyu steals one more smooch for the road before saying, “Let’s trade.”</p><p>He is holding out the paper bag now, coarse brown construction with a ruby red ribbon handle.</p><p>“It’s not really a fair trade if I’m giving you back what’s yours,” says Wonwoo. He hands over the hat anyway. “I’ll have you know that my love language is physical touch. Words of affirmation are a close second.”</p><p>Always, Mingyu’s eye crinkles blow embers into Wonwoo’s stomach. “Consider me surprised, based on the grand number of two make-outs we’ve had so far. C’mon, just take it.”</p><p>“Hold on, is this,” Wonwoo’s gaze narrows, “Kim Mingyu, you didn’t buy—”</p><p>“It’s a simple black set.”</p><p>“This says ‘tailor-made,’ so my measurements, how did you even—"</p><p>“Um, favors? So, anyway, Chae helped pick out the lining—”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Wonwoo loses the bet about the trailer.</p><p>Turns out the editors <em>were</em> bold enough to tease shirtless Mingyu shots, even if they are frustratingly obscured by a volleyball net in the foreground during the climactic montage. Still counts. So Wonwoo begrudgingly sends thirty thousand won to Hansol, who must be rolling in his share as one of the bigger proprietors of the winning minority group. It’s not so bad, though.</p><p>Those two precious seconds are treated like liquid gold. Kim Mingyu saturates Korean Twitter for days, while Naver and Pann are more preoccupied with pixel-counting to, for once and for all, gain closure on how many abs Kim Mingyu really has. And the fan cafe? It’s the most beautiful dumpster fire of thirsty fans and fans trying desperately to keep their chin above the water—and failing spectacularly.</p><p>All this, and watching cast-mates roast Mingyu so hard, he’s one more meme from dissolving into the cosmic refuse he’s made of, is an incomparable delight.</p><p>“One of the staff members joked that whoever replaced the sunscreen lotion with oil needed a raise,” one actor wryly reveals during the live-streamed press conference.</p><p>“And they were so god damn right,” cackles another.</p><p>“A mutual friend from America compared it to basting a turkey,” Seungcheol adds with dignified glee. He reaches over to poke at Mingyu’s comically exaggerated frown. “I was crying so hard from laughing that the director had to call for a break. Not my proudest moment. Sorry, Mingyu.”</p><p>Mingyu snatches the microphone before Seungcheol’s cracked composure can be made louder than it already is.</p><p>“Razz me all you want,” he hisses. “We’ll see whose fans buy out the theaters.”</p><p>Mingyu gets thoroughly confused with which camera to make laser eyes with his fingers, but he eventually gets it right and it’s exactly as charming as it sounds.</p><p>“<em>You, </em>everyone watching, go see the dang movie! You’ll see how it’s so much more beneath the surface. What’s in the trailer is just a taste for how deep, like <em>deep</em> deep, the story actually is.”</p><p>“I’ve been meaning to ask about that,” interjects hosting extraordinaire and the country’s collective husband, Boo Seungkwan, “That is, until the blistering fame your lean cuisine completely derailed my press conference! Let’s get it straight, people, I’ve known Mingyu for a long time. While he’s a never-ending thorn in my ass and his streetlamp height still ticks me off, he is so much more in tune with depth than people credit him for, and I’m sure anyone who knows him will agree that that is what makes him so lovable.”</p><p>Mingyu makes some coy swatting motion with a ridiculous bat of his eyelashes. “Aw shucks, Boo, you’ll make me blush on national television.”</p><p>“It won’t be the first time you’ll do that.”</p><p>“Ask the damn question!” a cast mate yells out in jest. “We’ve had enough of Mingyu flirting!”</p><p>“Very badly, too,” Mingyu stage-whispers. To the wrong camera, still.</p><p>There is another wave of polite audience laughter when the stage manager gives up on being quiet about the cameras Mingyu keeps missing. Mingyu apologizes by winking to the right cameraperson this time, who Seungkwan is quick to point out might be blushing themself.</p><p>It’s another episode of The Predominantly Male Cast Disses Each Other at worst, and reigned-in organized chaos at the expert hands of Seungkwan at best. Either way, Wonwoo thinks the premise is masterful for diffusing whatever controversies may come of the film’s subject matter because, really, it’s a Sisyphean task to refuse that charm for long. Though there may be some personal experience in the matter.</p><p>“Compared to the rest of the cast, Mingyu, your acting resumé isn’t exactly prolific,” says Seungkwan, leaning back into his lounge chair. “I’ve heard only good things—okay, maybe some bad, I gotta be transparent—about your role as the main character in the story. Sounds like a gigantic leap not only for the casting director, but also for you. There isn’t even any original source material outside of the script. How did you get into the role? And which demon did you sign a pact with to be so damn good at everything?”</p><p>Mingyu snorts before saying, “You’re right, there weren’t books or webtoons or things like that to reference. This script was entirely original. But, strangely, it wasn’t hard finding the motivation, or the inspiration, more importantly.”</p><p>“So what <em>was</em> your inspiration?”</p><p>Another pause, and then, “It’s not a secret that I didn’t start out doing this type of work. Humble beginnings, finding purpose and happiness in life avenues you never expected to, connecting to those who see you in a way you’ve wanted to be seen—I’m sure a lot of us, even those who are usually in the background, will relate to those feelings. That’s why I think a lot of people will enjoy the movie beyond the genre it’s in.”</p><p>Mingyu chuckles in a way that Wonwoo can easily replay in his mind: learning that someone so serious had written such a cute romance story; in umbrella shade and a dry, suffocating beachfront heat; over drinks and room service, or right beside shoe racks, or in other contexts to be written in the future.</p><p>It’s easy to see clichés as barrel-bottom platitudes. But, in recent days, Wonwoo has been a little more open to being proven wrong.</p><p>“Plus,” says Mingyu, eyes gleaming, this time perfectly nailing which camera to address, “I had a lot of amazing help behind the scenes.”</p><p>Seungcheol steals the microphone back to tack on, “God, I love my precious hoobae, but his poor acting coach had to practically hold him by the hand through it all! Mingyu looked like he was about to combust every time I so much as <em>looked</em> at him.”</p><p>“I would, too, woof,” jokes Seungkwan while fanning himself with cue cards.</p><p>“Oi oi <em>oi.” </em>Mingyu snatches back the microphone through the unabashed squealing in the audience. “First of all, I know my acting at first wasn't mind-blowing by any means, but I really wasn’t that bad and I got <em>way</em> better over time! My coach, well, my second one—”</p><p>“See, he needed another one!”</p><p><em>“Ssh!</em> Okay, yes, I did need another coach, but not because of my acting! Wait, no, I did need a second one for my acting, but not because I was bad, because the first one had personal things to deal with though I probably shouldn’t be saying that—look, <em>look, </em>I’m not wording this right and that’s not making a case for me, either. But! In my defense…”</p><p>Wonwoo finally loses control over the laughter bubbling up inside him. He’s still not used to it, hearing these happy sounds burst forth with little notice and feeling his face ache in consequence of them. But, as he sits alone in his apartment in unremarkable pajamas, mess of a bedhead from the early hour, while fiddling with a single, unpaired cufflink in his hand—</p><p>Wonwoo knows that there's no one else who could have possibly played his role as well as he did.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“The glory of the protagonist is always paid for by a lot of secondary characters.”</p><p>Tony Hoagland, American poet</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>In Defense of the Side Character</em>
</p><p>
  <em>FIN.</em>
</p><p> </p>
<table>
  <tbody>
<tr>
    <td><em>Director</em></td>
    <td>Lee Jihoon</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Screenplay</em></td>
    <td>Jeon Wonwoo</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td> </td>
    <td>Yoon Jeonghan</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Producer</em></td>
    <td>Yoon Jeonghan</td>
  </tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>Lead Cast</p>
</div><table>
  
  <tbody>
<tr>
    <td><em>Hyeon Jaesang</em></td>
    <td>Kim Mingyu</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td><em>Moon Chunghee</em></td>
    <td>Choi Seungcheol</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td></td>
    <td>...</td>
  </tr>
</tbody>
</table><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Aaand that’s it, folks! Thank you so very much for your patience and for following me on this wild ride. (Special thank you to The Boo, Seungkwan, for perpetually being my ending fairy.) While writing this chapter, I was thinking a lot about how MG’s parallel narrative turned out, though I don’t think I have the time or opportunity to write a full companion piece. Maybe I’ll write a blog post one of these days.</p><p>I’m technically marking this story as “complete,” but I’ll still see you in the epilogue! Lots of interesting topics across the board and it’s been fun exploring them all with such open-minded and kind readers. ☺️ I'd love to know what you thought!</p><p> </p><p>  <a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com/post/650771149405519872/in-defense-of-the-character-the-playlist">now with a newly-added playlist!</a><br/><a href="https://aijee.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a></p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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